Aphonous
by Shiggity Shwa
Summary: After a hot call goes dangerously awry an incident occurs which causes Sam to make some drastic decisions. Contains spoilers and speculations for 4x17. Sam's POV, later chapters are Jules POV. Sam/Jules.
1. Snow Globes

_A/N: So I think this fic needs a little explanation. It was created using an mixture of spoilers for 4x17 and pure speculation and my overactive imagination because I've been wanting to write this one for awhile. Therefore these aren't the exact events that will occur in 4x17 because I'm pretty sure I've decided to take crap in a whole other Shiggity direction and the story was actually roughly completed before the updated episode blurb so the chemical is different, but it should be interesting nonetheless.  
>The story was originally intended to be a oneshot, but then I thought more and more on it and added more lines and scenes and well now it should have four distinct chapters.<br>Another thing is I based the chemical very very loosely on a real chemical mostly because chemistry (and math) makes my head hurt. So if that's your forte and you're like "Psssh this chemical doesn't seem real or the reactions don't." Suck it up. From Just-World alone my computer history can get me arrested and I wasn't going to add chemicals to the mix more than I had to. _

Aphonous

Chapter 1/4

Snow Globes

The day started wrong. He woke up on Jules' side of the bed because yesterday's hot call ended with him on his back in an alley like a flipped turtle. He was chasing a subject, was actually doing a good job of it too, until he slipped off a greasy metal fire escape and landed a storey and a half below. Ed caught the guy of course. Meanwhile he reeled, back arched concave in the sludge, just liquid runoff from the dumpsters solidified.

When he could finally breathe through the quick flares of pain in his side, when he no longer felt like he was drowning in an ocean of garbage, when it became clear he only had a nasty bruise and maybe a slightly cracked rib, the guys sunk in their teeth, venom tipped with jest and torment. Even Raf made social commentary on how the rookie should be taking those falls. Jules cracked a line about how his routine was disqualified because he didn't stick the landing.

But once they were at home, the SRU cool gloves came off and the fretting girlfriend fingers kept dragging in crisp lines over the depressions between his ribs. Pressed deep enough to change the black bruised skin to white underneath the pressure of her fingertips, left permanent impressions. He laughed through gritted teeth to hide his pain, told her to stop, but didn't swat her hands away, never swatted away her hands.

She hugged him. Kissed him. Actually coddled him, because aside from one downtown explosion he's pretty untouchable. His back rested against her chest as they watched what shows he wanted. Every so often he'd release an empty moan, with no real pain behind it, just so she'd drop another kiss to his hairline from where his head laid against her shoulder. When bedtime came with his high expectations, she relinquished her side of the bed and told him it would be better for his injury.

It wasn't. Her side of the bed faced the window, which had the all night distractions of city lights and the early morning addition of sunbeams. All night he lay on his back and stared at the kaleidoscope of shadows as they mutated and trekked across his ceiling. How does Jules sleep here every night? How did he before she came along?

The morning dragged sluggishly. She got up half an hour before him. Kissed his cheek and messed his hair. He mumbled something about needing to shower with her because his side just hurt too much. She laughed, slapped his cheek and answered if it hurt that bad he should call into work. He should have listened to her. He should have called in. They both should have.

Three hours later Team One sat collected in the briefing room. Sarge sighed, rubbed at his head with the back of his hand and told them point blank that Toth was there. For a whole minute no one in that room breathed. Well, Raf probably did, but once they explained the definition of 'Toth' his eyes grew wide and distant. Probably the military part that did it, which was ironic because it was the psychologist part that did it for the rest of them.

Jules sent him an expression from across the table. It was an expression he knew well. One he wore himself. It conveyed the apocalypse, well of their relationship at least. Toth was here; he probably knew about their 'affair' and by the end of the day a choice would be thrust on them. The wonderful thing about retrospect is the answer is so infinitely simple. It was irrational but he ended up fixing all their problems, without consulting her, because she couldn't be consulted. It made him unreasonable, foolish because he ached for her.

Before the one-on-one interviews could begin, they got a hot call, a bomb threat. Toth allowed it. Wanted to see how the team interacted, especially with the addition of a new member. On the way down to the rigs Sarge gave a stern head shake but no spoken words to directly instigate his relationship with Jules. Instead he watched Jules drive off with Spike and enjoyed Raf's company in his own rig. For someone he spends eight to ten hours a day with, five to six days a week, he knows nothing about the guy.

An hour passed and info slowly trickled in. Sarge and Ed tried to pin down the location of the bomb. Jules and Spike split up. Spike went to the suspect's house to rummage through his basement and see what chemicals he could discover. While Jules went to his job, a dentist's office. He didn't like the idea of them splitting up, but Toth was monitoring conversations and he and Raf had to go interview the guy's ex-wife. There was nothing he could do. He should have done something.

Spike's voice rang in over the comm. link as he listed off the chemicals he found stored in this guy's garden shed. Some of them normal things he passes when doing stealthy grocery shopping with Jules. He loves the way she dresses down and argues with him about the importance of fresh vegetables. Halfway through the significance of 'vitamin B' speech he usually tells her he's going to get the meat. He wants to hear the speech. God, what he wouldn't give to hear that speech. He wishes he had a recording of it.

Jules informed that she was at the dentist office, one office out of six in a small, two storey complex. Apparently the office was closed, but the front door wasn't locked. Sarge told her to proceed, but take precautions. Spike said he was on his way. He stopped at a red light. Listened and imagined her opening a heavy handled door to a dark room, gun drawn to her face. The rig idled away even as the light flicked to green. Raf glanced over at him and pointed to the color shift. He repressed the need to give the rookie a half-lidded glance of ridicule.

Everything was casual. Ed summarized a possible location for the chemical bomb. He drove through the intersection without as much as a car turning into his lane. Then a sound blasted over the comm. link. It was loud, deep and his fingers wrung against the wheel. On first instinct, while the bile flooded his throat, he assumed she'd been shot again.

Her voice cleared the link before anyone could ask what happened. Breathier, more nervous than usual. A lot more. She was panicking. He used all of his resistance in order not to slam on the breaks and change directions towards her. He should have. "Guys, something happened."

"What's going on Jules?" Sarge questioned with his harsh tone of concern.

"The front door shut, mechanically or—I—it locked and now—" There was a beat. The longest beat in the world where he gripped the wheel so hard, the rubber burned indents into his skin. "Something's coming through the vents."

All of the moisture left his mouth. He couldn't swallow. He flipped on the sirens and before Raf asked what the hell he was doing, they were already on the highway heading towards her.

"What are you doing?"

"Spike—"

"We're going to help."

"It could be anything. This guy has enough chemicals to make anything worse than we've seen. Bigger than we've seen."

"Jules, stay calm and look for another exit."

"Like the guy didn't think to seal it up too?"

"Spike what's your ETA?"

"Less than five."

"This stuff is snowing down in the hallway. It's—" She started coughing. Kept coughing. Sometimes at night she has this whooping cough. It sounds painful and it's loud as hell. She told him once it was from her chain-smoking father.

This cough sounded nothing like the hollow night cough. This cough was painful. He knew, he could hear the lung tissue as it ripped. She wheezed deeply, once, twice. Then after a few heavy breaths regained enough composure to explain, "This stuff is—" but then started to cough again.

" Jules, concentrate on—"

"Stop talking."

"Shut up."

Sarge, Spike and himself all chimed in and told her in three distinct ways to keep her mouth shut. Talking only increased her inhalation of whatever chemical was blizzarding around in the air, into her lungs, her blood, her organs.

She answered by coughing, deeper, wetter. The wheezes between the hacks grew smaller.

"Jules?" Sarge tried to call her attention back again, but after telling her not to talk, was she really apt to answer? He knew she probably wouldn't, even if it was out of spite.

She coughed harder, a minuscule hiccup of a breath segmented a prolonged coughing chorus until it suddenly stopped accompanied by a dull thud. His foot pounded the gas pedal so hard, he's amazed it didn't break. He counted the seconds into the drive. Watched the clock. Tried to remember the little chemical training he received and what amount of time she had to get out of there. His body flushed as copious amounts of sweat leaked out of him. His eyes began to burn.

At a minute and a half Spike got to her. Pulled on a gas mask, crashed the glass panels on the front door, found her face down through the chemical haze and carried her out to decontamination and EMS. Raf said they should go back to interviewing the ex-wife because Jules was safe and there was a bomb. He answered Raf could have the rig and do whatever the fuck he wanted with it once they were at Jules' location.

When they finally got there, ten minutes later. Spike was in decontamination and would remain in there for another twenty minutes. Whatever this stuff was, it was ruthless. It was all over and inside Jules. He only caught a glimpse of her as they loaded her into the back of an ambulance. Her face was red and she had the same tube sticking out of her mouth that she did three years ago when she was shot.

The paramedics shut the doors and he rocked on the balls of his feet just praying it wasn't as bad as before. She shouldn't have to handle the pain. He couldn't handle losing her. Sarge approached him, told him they still had to catch the guy. But he honestly couldn't focus. Couldn't stay objective. He was offered up all these potential chances to intervene and didn't do a single thing. Jules was suffering for his mistakes again.

* * *

><p>Now his bones and muscles fall flaccid as he reclines in a chair. He's in the debriefing room, the lights off, and a few stars are visible over the glow from the neighboring skyscrapers. It was daytime when they corralled him into the room, all but hogtied him to the seat. He tried to leave before they found him, didn't even bother changing out of his cool pants before rushing to the elevator. Spike, who still didn't smell right, asked where he was going. Ed told him to stay put. Toth called him out in front of everyone.<p>

He's the pinnacle of a triangle. The apex of a mountain. Toth and Sarge create the other two points of what could be an equilateral if they all tried just a bit harder, but he's about two mandatory trust falls from the switch in his brain flipping off and the violent actions coming out to play.

No one has said a word in almost ten minutes. Each of those minutes, years that he'll never get back. He knows Toth's psychology, knows the intimidation is supposed to make him confess to the 'affair' he's been having. Toth probably wants to know all the sordid details; like the debriefing room is some high school bathroom and they're in between classes.

At this point he really has nothing left to lose, nothing left to give to the team, but he still has Jules. He just wants to hear her voice tell him off in that irritated tone which really hides her own mortification at being in a hospital. Wants her to roll those gorgeous eyes while he gathers her in his arms. Wants to feel her fingernails through his hair while he listens to her heartbeat just to confirm that she's really there.

So for her, he keeps up their tattered charade, remains quiet and silenced in the chair. But if he was hooked up to the polygraph machine like last time, his pulse would rocket the needle clean off. Maybe it would hit Toth. He grins a little at the thought.

"Constable Braddock." Toth's lips smack together. He clasps his hands on the surface of the table. "Are we really going to wait here all night?"

"We might have to if you don't start asking questions." His answer is almost immediate, like a bullet leaving a barrel.

Sarge doesn't respond, merely sits half mimicking his stance. He has the weak inclination Toth has already given Sarge shit for him and Jules. That Sarge is just here now because the rulebook says he has to be.

"Are you really going to deny it?"

"Deny what? You haven't asked me anything yet."

"Constable Braddock." Toth's voice usurps, it grows stern and their playground taunting is over. "It's obvious that you and Constable Callaghan broke probation by reinstating your romantic relationship. Since neither of you excused yourselves from the team—"

"We didn't see a reason why our personal lives are anybodies business."

"You're a danger to your team, not to mention civilians. You disobeyed direct orders today when you found out Constable Callaghan was in danger. Then had to be coerced back into doing your job."

"We got the guy." Ed got the guy. He was glad to be Sierra Two. He'd never been happier to be Sierra Two. Not that he didn't want to extract some homemade vengeance on the guy who made his girlfriend's lungs into chemical filled snow globes, but dealing with SIU and then Toth questioning the use of lethal force, he'd never see Jules.

Toth sighs, loudly, angrily. His face hidden by the dusk growing huskier and more menacing outside. "The fact remains that you cannot be objective. You've used lethal force on subjects before when they've threatened Constable Callaghan."

He shakes his head and crosses his arms in defiance. "If it was anyone else on the team, it wouldn't have been a problem."

"Sam," Sarge finally speaks, his hands slide across the desk but they're missing the olive branch. "You've previously admitted you would break the priority of life code for her."

He did. He would. He will. It's because she is his life. He's almost lost her twice now. He can't even count the near misses. Can't even count the blink-and-you'll-miss-it close calls. "So what now?"

"I need to know when your relationship began." Toth shuffles some papers in the dim light and retrieves a pen.

A smirk crosses his face, "the last time you came to visit."

"Excuse me?"

"The last time you were here. That's when we got back together." His smirk blooms and he remembers how perfect that moment felt. Finally being able to reconnect with Jules while at the same time figuratively flipping off Toth. "Jules and I are stubborn. You tell us we can't do something and we want to do it."

"So you've been breaking probation for—"

"A little over eight months."

"Anything else I should know?"

"Well, I'm going to propose to her on her birthday."

Sarge shakes his head. "Sam—"

He leans forward resting his chin on bent knuckles. "I think she kind of knows though. I've been asking her what she likes more gold or silver and she told me the silver is actually white gold."

He grins, remembers the way her fork halted halfway to her open mouth as questioned why some engagement rings were gold and some silver. He doesn't know if her expression was because actually brought up marriage or because he honestly didn't know gold could be white. It's her fault anyway; she brought up the honeymoon first.

He should be with her. He still doesn't know how badly she's been hurt. What if she still has that tube in her throat? After she got shot she had it in for over a day and the sight of it made his stomach swoop. When she woke up the first thing she did was try to yank it out. He stopped her last time, he stands from his seat and smoothes out the few creases in his pants, he'll stop her this time. "We done here?"

"Absolutely not Constable Braddock. We have to discuss the ramifications of your decisions. Disciplinary actions are in order not only for you, but Constable Callaghan as well."

As Toth continues to talk about the possibilities of one of them being fired while the other receives a pay cut and suspension from work, he surrenders the various SRU issued knickknacks from his belt and places them on the table. Toth doesn't seem to notice but Sarge does.

"Sam?"

"This team doesn't need me." He shrugs setting down his badge which catches the faint light just enough to cause a small flare. "I mean we work well together, but I'm replaceable." He places his sidearm on the table. "Jules isn't replaceable. Not to me."

"Constable Braddock, I guarantee you that if you walk out that door right now, you will not have a job at this SRU tomorrow."

"I know, I just quit."

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - Mock-epic Hospital Scenes. I'm beginning to hate them as much as Jules. <em>


	2. Self Contained

_A/N: After a long weekend of multiple work and school assignments and a brief stint where I considered dropping out of school to become Ke$ha, I finished chapter two quickly. Mostly because the whole story is rough drafted (aside from the specifics of chapter 4...like the ending. SYuuri wants a happy ending but me being me, I want to go against the grain) also because two pages were pre-typed up ages ago.  
>Thank you to everyone who reviewedalerted/favorited/read the first chapter. I'm glad everyone enjoyed it so much. I honestly didn't expect it to do so well, as it's a little bit of everything (angst/fluff/JW crazy with DA, DT protectiveness) rolled into four chapters. I'll try to get the 3rd chapter up post haste.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 2

Self-Contained

It's past regular visiting hours when he finally stumbles through the emergency entrance. It's the same hospital. The same goddamn hospital as last time. Same stuffy waiting room with the same peeling paint and the same sticky floors. He targets the triages nurse and lets his mouth ramble off the entire contents of that day, including his idea of a proposal and his spontaneous quitting. The nurse gawks at him because he's a one man daytime soap opera.

His patience is diluted. It was running on empty before Toth. This girl doesn't deserve the full hurricane force of his wraith but his fingers fold into a fist and he closes his eyes. Without realizing it, his fist bounces off the wall extenuating each word.

Thankfully, the same hospital delivers some perks, including some of the same nurses as before. Fate or God or karma or something stands on his side momentarily because from the background of the hustle and bustle of the ER, a nurse steps out of her predestined course and stares at him. She must recognize his cool pants and black t-shirt because he always used to visit Jules before and after he went to work.

The nurse doesn't appear familiar to him, but he burns a mental image of her into his brain. The St. Peter of the ER as she justifies his entry to the triage nurse. With pursed lips and pitying green eyes she beckons him to follow her down an empty corridor.

She stops before a door. A door littered with signs. Biohazard chemical warnings. Red, orange and yellow sheets plastered to the gateway in violent streaks. "You're going to need a suit."

She must be mistaking him for someone else. Maybe she assumes he's the new night janitor or something which would explain the look of compassion. But she rifles around on a nearby wire rack and shoves a white hazmat jumpsuit to his chest. "You need to put this on."

Oh shit. His first thought is oh shit. His second thought is of Jules, how much she was coughing. How the coughing was constant. How sometimes when she whoops at night, hard enough to sit up in the bed, he gets up without a word and travels in the dark to get her a glass of water from the bathroom sink.

He struggles to stretch the pliable material on over his clothing. He's never worn one of these before. Well in training, but in training he just fucked around with the other guys in his group. "What—How—Is she—"

"She's lucky the manic used a powder." The nurse interrupts, crosses her arms as he shoves his into the limp, cool texture of the suit. "If it was a gas, she and everyone in that building would be dead."

"So how bad—?" He can't finish asking the question because he's not sure if he wants to know the answer. Hands sweat inside rubber gloves creating a sticky powder caking to the inner creases of his fingers.

"All things considered she's extremely lucky. Limited exposure of less than ten minutes. She'll probably be out of contamination in a day or two."

"No I mean—"

"Oh, well she's extubated. On oxygen but her lungs and throat are ripped up pretty bad. She has a chemical burn from where her neck was exposed but it's low-grade. She's on a feeding tube and won't be able to eat for a few days. She won't be able to talk for at least a week though."

The zipper on the front of his suit falls to its death. The feeding tube is nothing new, she had one when she was shot. The chemical burn concerns him but it's low-grade. But not talking. For a week? "What?"

The nurse nods at the zipper and hands him the mask to cover his exposed face. "The chemicals almost destroyed her vocal chords. Even trying to talk is going to be extremely painful for her."

Automatically, he slides it on over his face, the nurses words become muddles over the megaphone sound of his own breathes. He's trapped, it reminds him of the scuba lessons The General forced him to take to overcome his hydrophobia. Then he remembers Jules, talking to them over the comm. link and him, Spike and Sarge all telling her to shut up. The last thing he said to her was, "Shut up."

"You can stay in there as long as you want. Just don't take off the suit." The nurse reassures him with a grin, like all he's doing is snorkeling and he's about to go into a tank full of clown fish. It's just water, Sam. "And make sure you decontaminate fully when you leave."

He lifts his hand out to the nurse as she starts to walk away. The suit makes a noise like a rubber balloon. "Can—Is it okay to touch her? Like hold her hand?"

Over her shoulder, she grins again, this time gentler. "I think that would be fine."

A minute passes until he thinks she's at a safe enough distance. He doesn't know how this stuff works. If he ever meets Spike again, he could ask him. A heavy palm slams into a bright red button that releases a klaxon and a hiss. The doors open to another set of double doors where he repeats the action. After the second horn and burst of air he's in a normal hospital room, at least she has a single this time around.

The room is large, too large for one person. He can tell they cleared it quickly because they needed a place to store her. They needed a place to store his contagious, chemical piñata of a girlfriend. The gray and green checkered floors are dimmed and diluted in the night. The windows are not shrouded by blinds and bright lights from neighboring office buildings create a radiating glow.

The bed sits in a corner, along with several machines and IV stands with numerous wires and tubes running like rampant highways. She looks like a vigil in a Catholic church. Like a dozen or more candles should be strewn around the bed. There's a single side table, the lamp still on, neck still craned slightly to the side like it's asking him what he's waiting for, in an eerie way it's also indicating the only chair.

His first step crosses him through the threshold. He feels like he's on the moon except he has all the gravity of Earth. His respirations still sound like the lyrics of a heavy metal song inside the suit and his back is starting to sweat. He's terrified.

Memories of Jules after she was shot wash over his brain in waves. Her weakness and pain. How she started to push him away because he was constantly there, because no one else was. How he assumed she would quit and get a safer job. How she broke up with him for it. How maybe this time he overcompensated by prematurely quitting. How he wants to take the job in overseas. How he wants to take Jules with him. Carry-on baggage.

The sound of the material over his shoes hitting the floor with each clomping footstep can't be heard over his breathing. He's out of breath. Like he's just run a marathon. He wonders if this is what she felt like. A fraction of what she felt like. He knows the footsteps clomp too; he's physically exhausted, mentally fatigued and emotionally unwell.

When he's about a foot from the bed a sound finally usurps his own constant breaths. The wet crackles of Jules' breathing. Her chest rises in slow, labored, deep successions, each sounds like her coffee machine when it starts brewing. Sounds like a car engine flooding. Sounds like metal scraping against metal, slowly, in suffering.

In the splash of light, he tries to comprehend the hierarchy of machines. The feeding tube runs into her nose, the oxygen mask on top of that. He distinguishes three electrodes with wire rat tails swiveling out of the top of her gown, he knows there are more. The ECG machine peaks and plops at a normal rate. A clip on her finger monitors blood pressure. An IV inserted in left hand for, he doesn't even know. He'll ask when he leaves.

Her eyes are shut, slight, and peaceful but the skin is darkened. Her face seems to have lost the rouge he saw earlier that day. Just a simple reaction to having corrosive materials land on her skin. She's lucky none went in her eyes, a single flake of powder on her pupil and there goes the whole retina. He gets shaky. Throat tightens, mouth over salivates, and the back of this throat tingles. He doesn't even want to know what happens if he throws up in the hazmat suit.

She's sleeping and he doesn't want to bother her. Jules doesn't fall to sleep easily to begin with, factor in a hospital on top of the injuries and he's sure it took her several Toth interviews to gain the nerve to even close her eyes. He eyes the chair, he can stay all night, it's not like he has anywhere else to be. Anywhere he'd rather be.

When he reaches forward to pull the chair closer to her, the feet accidentally drag across the ground, groaning as bald metal shaves against ceramic tile. Jules flinches with a gurgled inhalation and her throat grates out a few rough coughs. Immediately he drops the chair and gravitates towards the bedside. Her breathing increases a little and he's willing to bet it's because all she can see is some freak in a giant white suit.

"Jules." He grasps her furling fingers, like the petals of a flower at midnight, too much pressure and they'll crumble and sway. "Sweetheart, it's me."

The nervousness lasts for a split second more, just enough for him to see the Rocky Mountain spike on the heart monitor. The blood pressure numbers at the side elevate until they resemble a telephone number. He keeps her hand with his, careful of the clip and the IV. "Jules, it's just me."

His fingers are encased in sausages, incapable of feeling the slightest thing. Her fingers are matchsticks. Her hand is a snowflake, touches his skin and melts away. The apprehension in her hand releases and it relaxes. When he glances up to her face she's smiling under the oxygen mask. A weak flicker, a dim hope, a huge relief.

"God, I've been waiting all day for that." He encloses her hand in his couch cushion and brings it to the side of his face. He can't feel it. He doesn't want to think about what that means metaphorically. Instead he remembers how soft, how cool her hands feel. About how different they'll look with a white gold ring on one finger. He's already bought it. It's behind a wobbly board in the back of his closet where he used to keep—unmentionable material. Surprisingly he managed to hide it from Natalie, the bloodhound who can smell expensive apparel through time.

Her hand breaks free of his buried inside the thermal winter gloves. Cups the side of his face like he can still feel it. Smooth delicate thumb pad coursing over his cheek. An eye roll and irritated voice telling him to go shave. Her eyes blink heavily, stick for a moment and reopen out of duty. Her corneas are red. Under the oxygen mask her lips part, white powder crusting the corners of them. "Suh—"

"No." He tears her hand away, this time encapsulating it in both oven mitts at the respirator where his lips should be. Where they tremble within plastic to taste her skin and he shakes his head. "No Jules. You can't be talking. The nurse said not to."

There's the eye roll. Somehow it relaxes him. The sense of normalcy. Waking up to protein mango smoothies and her sly smile while he begs for something else until she finally sighs and asks what exactly he wants. Sometimes he says, "Just you Jules." Sometimes he gets it.

Mentally, his fingers scrape at the bits of normalcy because her voice. That fraction of a syllable. It sounded like an out of tune violin. Like her vocal cords are an unkempt garden, unvisited for years, covered in moss and sharp tendrils of rotting wrought iron fencing.

He just wants to feel her. Is she hot? She's usually pretty cold, but the chemical could be screwing with her temperature. Her skin looks clammy. Looks greenish, golden. The color skin takes on after wearing fake jewelry. The polka dotted hospital gown hangs slack around her neck and he wonders if she's already lost weight. She lost weight after she got shot too. He said it was not actually eating anything. She said it was the hospital.

He wants to feel the pliable smoothness of her skin underneath his dry fingertips. Coil her hair between his fingers in silken bunches; guess what scent her new shampoo is. He wants to kiss her. Not kiss her purely for sexual pleasure. Even kiss her for comfort. Kiss her for reassurance. Kiss the crown of her hair, her eyelids, her chin, her cheeks, her nose.

Last winter they went for a night stroll and the snow started to fall when they were in the park, flakes ballroom dancing under the street lights. She commented on the beauty of the scene. He watched her, snow-speckled hair, each breath visible, cheeks rosy. She took notice and shook her head at him.

His hand snaked around her waist and he whispered a sideway compliment into her hair. She doesn't receive compliments well. Scoffs them off, or ducks her head away. This time he must have said something to strike her, because she curled into his arms and kissed the tip of his nose. When she stepped back a small puff of smoke twisted out of her mouth and he chuckled.

He wants to pull away from her body knowing his body is going to carry her flavor with him for the rest of his life. But this suit, it's not for handling hazardous materials, it is a hazardous material. It makes his mind spiral, his body ache for companionship.

Jules flexes her fingers in his boxing gloves, flicks him in the face with a hollow thump. His eyes meet hers through the plastic glare. She's squinting and shaking her head at him, though it's more of a loll against the pillow. "What?"

A finger wags in his face followed by five grouped as a fist. In their eight month secret affair pseudo relationship that has the raw ability to crush not only men, but whole teams, they've gotten to know each other well. Better than they did before. Almost on a frightening level. He knows she's ashamed of the scar the bullet tore through her body, she told him she wanted to get it removed. She won't look at it. Squirms away from him, from mirrors.

Now somehow she could catch the random ideas fluttering around aimlessly in his id. He just wanted to be with her. After everything today, was it so much to ask to be able to sit down next to his girlfriend and touch her skin. It technically wasn't an SRU sin anymore.

The thought, the idea, the knowledge that he's not going to be able to be with her for the next few days eats away at him like he's sure the chemical did to her lungs. He wants to stand solitary beside the bed, try to blend in with the machinery. He turns her hand over in his, runs a thick, chemical retardant finger around the tape holding the IV to her veins. She has tape under her nose too, holding the feeding tube in place. A lazy attempt at a science project.

"They might not let me back in here tomorrow." It's not what he wants to be telling her. He should tell her he quit. He's not a good provider because he's jobless. The honeymoon might have to be put on hold due to lack of monetary funds. He wants to take her to France with him. It's only a year contract, they could sell his apartment, keep her house.

Sleep is winning over her irritated, bloodshot corneas hidden behind thick layers of gray lashes. She nods once, so he knows she heard. Then her eyes flutter open again waging war against the rest she desperately needs.

His arms hover around her, around the traplines of tubes and wires. Arms weave under her arms and he arches his body so he can hug her to him. They both keep their eyes closed. Jules, maybe because she's tired, but he'd like to think she's imagining what he is. They're at home, reclined on the couch, fighting for the remote. She complains about his junk food while he laughs at her words. She taps him in the cheek with the pad of her barefoot.

"I love you Jules. I love you so much." The words crack and echo in the semi-sphere around his head. They sound almost threatening through the deep hissing of the respirator. Her fingers clutch at his back and he knows it's the best she can do at reciprocating. He feels everything, but he can't feel a thing.

When he leans back he notices a white patch of gauze pasted down the length of her neck, the right side facing away from him. Chemical burn. Low-grade indeed. She inhales deeply; her chest and ribs shake violently under the sheets and hospital gown. She sounds like an eighty-year-old asthmatic with aggravated emphysema. Like a tractor trailer is parked on her chest. Like she's drowning in her own lungs because the chemical wafted down and settled into the stalactites of her bronchioles like bats.

Dragging the chair closer, he sits only a few inches from her and suppresses the need to run a rubber hand through her hair. He fixes the sheets around her, the way she likes them, not close to her neck, not near her left side. "Go to sleep Jules." Pumpkin thumb runs over her fatigue immobile fingers. "I'll be here. Go to sleep."

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - Sam meets up with another character. And complications occur at the hospital. Take your guesses I love the guesses.<br>_


	3. Again

_A/N:__Hey guys. So chapter three is both long and probably riddled with spelling and grammatical errors as I edited late into yonder eve. Honestly I didn't want to read it anymore because in my opinion the fic is getting to 'fluffy' to me, which we all know means I can't mention vomit or condoms so I don't like it. **FUN FACT:**__I liked one paragraph out of this entire almost 5k chapter. Feel free to guess which one it is.  
>Now that my hatred of fluff and my writer cultivated angst is out on the table, thanks so much for your reviewsfavorites/alerts and most of all reading. A lot of people have said they've reread the other chapters several times, I'm glad you're enjoying the story so much. The ending is still up in the air, and the story will most likely have a 5th chapter to accommodate the length. Since chapters 3 and 4 are large enough as it is. Also SYuuri won't let me write Just-World until I finish this story. So send your love to her because I have a habit of finishing shit.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 3

Again

Thirty-six hours later he stands at his locker. It's half empty, in the middle of a manual stomach pumping. All the crap inside, none of it really matters. He's been through this before, collecting personal items in a frenzy before being shipped off for days and days of cross examination. He thought walking down the hallways one last time, seeing the locker Wordy used to have, that it all might stir some sentiment in him but honestly over the last day and a half he's waded through so much shit closing this chapter of his life doesn't affect him at all.

Everything has been tossed into a lidless cardboard box. Thrown in without a care because he doesn't give a shit. Holleran called his cell today, told him in a stoic voice to clean out his locker. Fine. Remaining brain cells pooled and he chose a time contrasting with when they would be in. A shift Team One wouldn't be on duty for, even if they weren't down two members. He doesn't want to run into Sarge who still thinks there's a way to verbally work this out. Or Ed who's left a dozen fuming messages on his voicemail.

The only things he handles with precaution are the three pictures decorating the inside of his locker door. Two of him with The General. He doesn't know why the hell he keeps them here; all the other guys have pictures of their families, their wives and kids and parents. His door remained blank until Spike made a joke about no one loving him. So he found two random pictures of The General. He shouldn't have displayed them. He hates The General. Within the next week he's bound to get a phone call full of expletives for quitting. It will be so accosting The General might as well be standing in the same room. At some point the thought of the red face on the other end of the line will just make him hang up, but he'll still feel the spittle fleck at his skin all the way from B.C.

The other picture is of him and Matt. It's the only picture he has of Matt. The only brother he had. Unless he ever meets Jules' brood of brothers, but every time he asks about them she shrugs away, bows her head, and changes the subject. Same with her father, which is a whole other story.

He never got to put up photos of her in his locker, because, well that would kind of blow the whole 'secret relationship' thing. It seems so stupid now. How Ed and Wordy, even Sarge with Marina get to keep pictures of their wives and girlfriends and yet he has to be ashamed of his. He has the perfect photo too. This year for his birthday Jules, Nat and him flew out West for the weekend. Jules met his mom for the first time and his mom instantly approved. Kept giving him the not-so-secret thumbs up all weekend. The General wasn't there so it was absolutely flawless. In the photo they're sitting in his parents' backyard at a picnic table. She's leaning her back against his side and his arm is draped casually around her hip. Natalie is pulling a face in the background.

The locker door slams and he lifts up the last four years of his life in a box. The room is left without so much as a second glance or a single nostalgic thought. He always assumed he'd leave the SRU the same way most guys do, as an old bastard at a retirement party. All liquored up and thanking way too many people. It's kind of disappointing to know that he could have helped more people, but he'll help in a different way. He presses the down arrow on the elevator panel and waits as it illuminates.

"Sam?"

Spike stands behind him, un-uniformed in a light blue dress shirt and jeans. His appearance is ragged, his eyes are bloodshot and it looks like they should be having a contest for who's avoided sleep the longest. Thirty-six hours and counting.

It's not that he didn't try. He tried at his apartment but when he got home at, his sister, his little baby sister whose jaw was still littered with bruises because some heroin freak thought it was okay to hit her, glanced up from her daytime talk show and asked, "You're home early. Did you and Jules have a fight?"

And he cried. Started to sob in the open doorway, his back to the hall. Fell dramatically on his knees like he was lurching before the whole church congregation. Natalie shut the door and knelt next to him. With repetitions of 'Sammy', she kept badgering him about what happened as she hugged him and failed to calm him. He couldn't talk. Jules couldn't talk.

He finally told her. After she suggested he have a shower and take some sleeping pills and just rest, Natalie promised everything would work out fine. What the fuck did she know? He didn't acknowledge her answer, just shuffled to his room, lied on top of the bed fully clothed including his work shoes and stared at the stupid window. Omnipresent city lights seemed like a selling point when he bought the place. Jules side of the bed smelled like him. His side of the bed smelled like him. She was already disappearing.

He went to her house three hours later. Used his key and took his shoes off as a courtesy. He climbed the stairs and found her bed, premade, unslept in like a quaint bed and breakfast. It was home. Her home was his home. She was his future, but she was absent and it was like the lifeline carved into his hand suddenly ended. He showered, smelling her shampoo. This month's was pomegranate. He dried using her towels. He grabbed some clean clothes from his drawer in her dresser, earned five months ago when he bitched about having to go home so often. She'd done the laundry. She folded his top.

He slept in her bed in brief sessions of ten to fifteen minutes for maybe an hour. Mind muddled, confused. Kept reaching out to touch her. Once he woke up under the impression it was three years ago, and Jules was beside him in her post-gunshot wound phase. He asked the empty mattress if it needed anything. Any more pain medicine? The heating pad? When he received no answer and his hand clawed through only air, he jumped out of bed in frantic search of his wounded girlfriend. Right woman, wrong wound.

"So you really quit, huh?" Spike nods to his box of shitty knickknacks and three pictures. He just wants the pictures.

"Yeah."

"Toth and Sarge didn't give you a free pass? I mean last time Ed quit and—"

"Ed wasn't sleeping with a teammate, Spike." He likes Spike. In all honestly he does. He's a funny guy, he's a loyal guy. He could ask Spike for a favor in passing, forget about it and the next day Spike will have it done. But Spike is naïve. Naïve from over thirty years of living with his parents.

Instead of the shocked expression he expects, a small smile flashes by on Spike's lips. "How is she?"

"Still in contamination. They won't let me see her. Haven't after the first day. They say it's a danger and she doesn't need the added stress."

"She'll get better. She's Jules." Everyone keeps telling him this. People with no authority keep telling him this. Sure they've know her longer. But he knows her inside and out. He knows how terrified she is to be in that room isolated from everyone but hospital staff. If they don't let him in today he's breaking in. Suit or no suit.

The elevator pings, interrupts the ocean of silence growing between him and his former teammate. That was always the voiceless downfall to the secret relationship, he knew it, is sure Jules does too. Deciding to hold each other in a more intimate manner means the eventual segregation of the rest of the team. Before they were teammates, equals, now the remainder of Team One stands above him, judging and debasing. Perhaps even blaming him for the decapitation of the team.

But Spike did him a favor. A huge favor. Risked his own life to retrieve Jules in his proxy. "Spike, I never did get a chance to thank you. I mean you broke protocol to—"

"Anyone one of us would have done it for anyone." Spike's words are nonchalant. His chivalrousness dissipates into the ducts of the SRU circulating cool air. His hands hide in crossed arms and the hint of the smile still remains.

Neither of them bring up the shared attribute that they both broke the priority of life code. He left his post, and sluggishly returned only after being coerced by Sarge. This wasted time on both accounts, time in which a nuclear winter could've rained down in Toronto. When Spike broke the windows to the dentist office, he released toxins into the building. If it wasn't cleared, others could've been contaminated. Spike putting his life at risk when he's the principal bomb disarmer didn't sit well with Toth either.

"It was a great four years." Squeezing the box under one arm, he holds a hand out for Spike to shake. None of this is going the way his mind imagined. It's not a banquet. He's not drunk on scotch or upset about the life choices he's made. It seems like a lame way to say goodbye to such a close friend, but what the hell are they supposed to do?

Spike shakes it, pulls him into sort of a semi-hug. "Good luck. I'll probably see you at the hospital after Jules gets out of decontamination." He didn't have the nerve to tell him that she can't talk. Ironically it's not the sort of thing that he could casually weave into the conversation.

* * *

><p>At the hospital, he arrives with two plastic bags. Even if they won't let him see her, maybe they can give her a care package to let her know he'll be waiting until they will. He'll always be waiting. He's spent the majority of his time at this hospital in the waiting room with his dirty, ratty sneakers flat on the ground and his hands clasped together in a pre-prayer stance. The rest of his time has been spent cleaning her house. He doesn't know why, just a ridiculous amount of time washing down the baseboards and cleaning the cobwebs from ceilings she can't reach.<p>

The bags only hold a few things. A few easily replaceable things, because when she comes out of decontamination, they won't. First he grabbed a book from her shelf, it's thick and dog-eared and she complained a few months back about wanting to reread it but never having the time. Then he grabbed her knitting, which despite the waves of ridicule he threw at her when he discovered the talent, he begged her for a hat. He didn't wear a hat all winter in the slight hope she would take the hint and knit him a goddamn hat. She never did and he figures now is the perfect time to start, even if he can't actually have it.

He brought a pair of her sweatpants, and was going to bring her a t-shirt, but logic reminded him tubes stood in the way of it fitting properly. Instead he grabbed one of his dress shirts, a black one that buttons up all the way. She hates hospital gowns; after she was shot she protested every single aspect of them, from being cold to being exposed. Back then they wouldn't let her wear a normal top because of the gunshot wound. Maybe she'll be able to wear his, smell it and think of him. He also dug through her underwear drawer, an act that made him depressed and disgusted with himself because he was trying to find pairs she and he would mind not having anymore.

On the way to the hospital he made a few stops. One to pick up some toiletries, because she has specifics, doesn't like to switch from them aside from the shampoo. He likes that about her, it's an attribute that's definitely feminine, definitely Jules. He buys a notebook and a pen because she has to communicate with him somehow. They're close, but their minds haven't melded yet. The last thing he buys is an exact cloned copy of panda slippers. They stare at him with black beady eyes as if to ask, again?

Hospitals rely on routine and even though for the last thirty-six hours he's only seen the waiting room, he always follows the same path, looks for the same nurses, and wears the same expression of trepidation and hope. The nurse finds him this time, much like she did on that first faithful night. He still doesn't know her name. In his mind he just calls her Pete.

"I know I can't come in. I was wondering if someone could give her something for me."

The nurse sinks her teeth into her lower lip and cradles a chart to her chest. The scrubs she wearing are bright, clashing colors that look like a 90s motel carpet. She sucks in air through her teeth and scans her card to enter into the waiting room. A few of the ill notice and groan like zombies.

She grabs his bicep firmly and leads him away from the triage. "No one told you?"

His heart starts a club remix. The bags' handles crinkle in his hands. He's Jules' emergency contact. When they forced him to leave her side, after he asked what was in the IV—pain medication for her throat, he updated her contacts. Gave them his cell number. Never turned it off. His tongue brushes against his lower lip. "What happened?'

So many things could have gone wrong. She could be intubated again. She could be in surgery for some unknown reason. She could be aspirating blood. She could be having a second wave of side effects from the chemical. He questions why he ever left the fucking hospital.

"We moved her."

"Why?" Surgery, it has to be surgery. She got shot just below the lung. Broken ribs, flayed muscles. Her chest was already weakened.

The nurse smiles and pats his arm. "She went through decontamination this morning. She's in the ICU now. Floor seven."

"She's cleared?"

"Well she's out of decontamination. It's the first step."

Half of him wants to run his fist through the wall, because he told them, repeated in rambles and then in a slow distinctive tone to match his bobbing head for added comprehension, to call him if anything changed. He could have been here for her when she finally got out of the room, when they wheeled her through the ER on a gurney that might as well have been a royal carriage because she assumed everyone's was looking at her, taunting.

The remaining half wins out, the part flushed in relief, soaking it up like a sponge, seeping at the sides with it and not complaining a bit. He just wants to see her. He shakes Pete's hand, thanks her for everything she's done. Breaking the rules on the first night by letting him sneak in stealth-like in a hazmat suit that might as well have been an Easter Bunny suit.

The elevator doesn't arrive. Well he doesn't know if it ever does, because he jams the 'up' button until the pressure almost bends his thumb backwards. After the seventh consecutive jab, and holding down the button with the force of the last thirty-six hours, he gives up and shoves the door to the adjacent stairwell open.

He climbs the stairs like he's wearing a bulletproof vest and a sniper rifle on his back. Like he's going to be searching for the vantage point and the first pang of longing hits him. He's not exactly torn. Nine out of ten times he'll choose Jules before the job, that tenth time representing when she broke up with him and he was so confused and broken hearted that he couldn't function. He just wishes he knew the job was ending; maybe he would have appreciated it more.

Rounding the third floor in a strong gait, and in the back of his melancholic mind he does remember a cell phone ringing yesterday. Morning? Night? He can't segregate them anymore. Time zones in Alaska, without her the sun doesn't set, or rise. Staring wide-eyed at her ceiling, left arm lazily wrapped around her pillow, her scent. He slammed his right hand blindly down on the bedside table until he found the ringing device and brought it too his ear.

It wasn't until after he connected the call that he realized it was her cell, not his. He didn't even get a chance to utter a greeting before a voice interrupted him. It was an unfamiliar voice, older and deeply masculine. There was a scruffiness to it, one too many cigarettes smoked. One too many cigarettes swallowed. A slight twang only crazy mountain D.B. Cooper type men kept. The sever gruffness came through in his first sentence. "Jesus Christ Julianna, why the fuck do I have five goddamn messages on my machine telling me you're in the hospital?"

It was her dad.

He was about to reply. About to tell her father, that his daughter was fine, just sort of contagious at the moment. But before he could, before he could remember brief words Jules had spoken about her father, the man continued, "It's not like there's a goddamn thing I can do from Medicine Hat and you belong there too if you think I'm flying down."

Then the floodgates open. After she was shot Sarge kept asking her who he should contact. She kept answering no one. Spike was enlisted to find her dad in Medicine Hat. In less than fifteen minutes they had the info. The phone call was shorter than the effort. Later in confidence Jules told him her father's surly attitude stemmed from him blaming her for her mother's departure. Apparently four kids were fine, but five was the straw that packed her mother's bags.

"—constantly injured? How are you still on the force?" Her father took a deep inhalation of what he expected was the man's sixtieth cigarette of the hour. "I told you that you'd make a shitty cop."

He snapped. Absolutely snapped. Shot up in bed, body hinged at the waist as he wondered what the fuck Jules actually had to put up with growing up. Fingers and toes curled, muscles clenched. "Your daughter is in the hospital."

"Who the fuck is this?"

"This is Sam Braddock, her boyfriend." He wanted to continue, tell him how Jules is an amazing cop. How she tackles perpetrators like a panther. How she repels effortlessly down the sides of buildings like it's an undiscovered art. How her aim is better than his and he was born a sniper. How she's his every single breath.

But her father interrupted him, "Good, you take care of her then."

There was a click and then the incessant dial tone. At least now he'll never need to have the awkward phone conversation where he asks permission to marry Jules. Not that he would, because she would murder him.

Jules abandoned by a mother, a father, a brood of brothers, and now in some ways the Team, her makeshift family. He is going to take care of her. God willing, for the rest of his life.

The '7' gleams in the industrial stairwell lighting. A white flare up, a mini explosion in hole to hell he stands in. The door handle crumbles under his the full weight of his body and the immediate bright and false chipper atmosphere of the quiet ICU greets him.

In hospitals there is an infinite number of nurses sitting behind and infinite number of desks just waiting for him to act like a moron before they actually do something to help him. This one sits in an almost comatose state, mouth slightly agape at the computer, typing with slow strokes of each finger. She only has to type a first name and a last name, even though it's Jules' he's tired of spelling it out for her.

Finally when he's about to hop the desk, shove her back and hack the system with his limited knowledge, she glances up; her eyes glazed over in TV static, too many hours staring at too many screens. "Room five."

She doesn't bother pointing him in the right direction; he doesn't bother thanking her for wasting a huge chunk of his life. The ICU is formatted in a classic square pattern, so he finds the room with ease. He lingers in the doorway, fingers twisting the plastic bags' handles, twirling them tightly and letting them unwind.

A nurse, older and heavier than the android at the desk is fussing over Jules' IVs, making sure the tubes don't tangle together. Jules sits on the side of the bed. Clad in a comparable hospital gown to the one he last saw her in. Her legs, bare from her knobby knees down, hang and wobble loosely like marionette appendages. She's lost weight, it frightens him.

The ECG machine and the fingernail ornament are absent which is a definite improvement. The oxygen mask as been replaced with an inhaler to soothe her throat. When she holds it away from her mouth, vapors roll out the end. Her hair is a messy nest on the back of her head; it extenuates the pristine square of gauze on the side of her neck.

"Tomorrow we'll try introducing food." The nurse fiddles with the monitor on the IV, double checking the chart and then the digital numbers. She's either very efficient, or she's screwed up before. But she carries on a conversation with Jules like she's going to answer. "You'll have to be on the feeding tube until we can keep a—"

The bags drop from his hand and hit the ground with a thump and a plastic hiss. Jules, still in a semi-fetal position while sitting up, glances towards the door. He watches the silent recognition wash over her facial features, the way her slightly pink eyes perk up and her lips part to create a grin. She swallows, flinches her eyes in pain at the action, and opens her arms to him.

He ducks under the cord of the inhaler. Laughs as he holds her, not too tight because her chest is frail and quivers under his arms. She still smells like Jules, not weird like Spike did after decontamination. Maybe Spike always smelled weird and he just never noticed.

Her body temperature is hot. Not the cool skin on the feet and legs he's used to weaving their way between his while sleeping parallel to her for the last eight months. Her arms are linked around his neck, and her feverish cheek brushes against his repeatedly. He shaved. Remembered to shave for her.

He kisses everywhere he swore he would, her cheeks, her chin, her forehead, the dark discoloration of skin around her eyes, her lips, and her nose. He has to be careful of the tube, not to jostle it. Finally they just rest against each other, her head tucked tightly underneath his chin. One of her hands within his; the other playing with the hem of his shirt as his thumb absently rubs the unburned side of her neck. "I'm sorry I wasn't there Jules."

She breaks contact. Both her hands hold his cheeks, fingers searing pinpoints into his skin as she stares into his eyes shakes her head. He leans forward pecking her nose once in remembrance and she lets out a silent laugh. She knows what he's thinking of. He rests his forehead against hers so their noses touch and they share the same content sigh.

"I take it you know this man then." The nurse interrupts their reunion. She's writing something out on Jules' chart, but over her thick rimmed glasses, her gray eyebrows take a skeptical plunge.

"Sorry." He steps back, but keeps an arm around Jules. Always wants to keep an arm around her. "I'm Sam Braddock. I'm her boyfriend and she's my everything." She gives him a harsh exhale probably meaning it to be a snort and hits him in the chest with the back of her hand. It lands with a hollow thump.

"Oh I like this one." The nurse chuckles. Apparently understanding his innate need to be alone with Jules she replaces the chart and walks towards the door. "I'll be back in an hour to switch over your IVs. And don't forget about the inhaler."

"You should keep using this." He fixes the inhaler, unraveling the cord and picks it up from the bed. The smoke smells vaguely minty. He wishes he could take her home now. She hates this place. He hates this place because she does. He'll stay with her for as long as he can, but visiting hours only account for so much of the day, she'll be alone at night. So will he. "I don't want you to get worse."

Another stern exhale is followed by her replacing the inhaler back into her mouth. She wheezes when she uses it, it's disconcerting, but apparently it's helping so he tries not to notice. "I brought a few things for you, just in case they wouldn't let me see you again."

A curious eyebrow arches as he takes a seat on the bed next to her. The way she holds the inhaler makes her look glamorous, like a 1920s movie starlet. Her head lolls to his shoulder, and she releases a wheeze like squealing tires. "I brought you that book you want to reread, and yarn so you could knit if you wanted too."

Her lips purse and pull into a sardonic expression because she knows exactly what he's hinting at. He hinted at it the same way when he bought the yarn and left it on her bed with a hat pattern. He said Santa brought it. That only pissed her off more.

"I got this notebook so if there's anything you need to actually tell me you can."

She rolls her eyes and sighs incredulously at him. His blood pressure lowers a little because all he's missing is the lengthy speech about however he's agitated her. He wonders what did it this time. What features of a notebook and pen could possibly irk her, it's not like he can bring his laptop in her and give his girlfriend a computer voice. At least if he reads her chicken scratch, he can read it in her voice.

"Hey you should be more grateful, I almost got you a Speak-and-Spell."

Another silent laugh followed by a genuine smile at his thoughtfulness. She places a kiss on his cheek. His arm circles around her waist open palm landing on her thigh. His hand almost consumes her thigh. Casually, without showing her just how disturbed he is, he withdraws his arm and reaches for the second bag.

"I also brought you these." He stops his voice from cracking and pulls out perfectly folded clothing that reminds him of his days in the army. She's always saying he's too messy and she doesn't know how he survived the army. "I brought you my shirt because I know you don't like the gowns and you could button it over –"

She hugs him hard. Might actually fling herself at him. Boney arms crushing his neck as the light weight of her body presses against his. He closes his eyes and just revels in the fact that she's there, while ignoring the half of her that isn't. They made it over the first hurdle; she's no longer a chemical nightmare or biological weapon. She's in his arms, her skin rubbing against his. His nose in the nape of her neck. His lips on hers. But a sense is still missing.

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - Panda slippers (I didn't forget I just needed to cut), and an actual complication. <em>


	4. Almost Finished

_A/N:Hey guys. I like this chapter just a smidgen more than the last, the whole story is getting too fluffy (my version of fluffy because you guys decide to argue with me haha) and repetitive for me. But Chapter 5 is my baby. I started writing it before this chapter was completely finished. That's how good it is. So don't miss the ending because none of you (I'm willing to bet on this too) will guess what's going to happen. But feel free. My goal is to have the story finished by the 16th, the day I return to the brimstone of hell from which I was sired for the holidays.  
>Thanks for the reviewsfavorites/alerts and of course just reading. I didn't mean everyone out there should reread the chapters religiously, just that a lot of you do. And I feel bad, because you're probably picking up all my late night spelling errors haha.  
>Also enjoy the pun in the title.<br>_

Aphonous

Chapter 4/5

Almost Finished

"Natalie keeps asking me how you are. Every day when I get home she's lying on the couch like she's been there all day, but I know she's been cleaning and doing things to take care of the apartment because it's still intact. She keeps telling me that she wants to come and visit you and I keep having to make up excuses. We both know she can talk and without you interrupting her verbal rampage, she'll talk until your ears bleed."

It's been three days since Jules was successfully decontaminated. She's slowly returning to the woman he remembers, the one who shoves him out of the way when he's hogging the sink or the shower head. The one who purposely hides his keys when it's time for him to leave, he can't prove it, but he swears she's responsible because they always go missing five minutes before he has to leave. The one who scowls and accepts any challenge no matter what the dangers are.

They removed her feeding tube yesterday in a scene so horrific he'll never forget it. She kept down the soups, the Jellos, and the juices they fed her. As a reward, they abracadabra'd the garden hose from her body while she painfully exhaled. She coughed a lot. Blood dripped out of her nose like thick paint, frothed a pale red at her nostrils. He held her hand through the whole ordeal, like it made a single difference. She also only uses the inhaler intermittently now, mostly when reclining for a reason he can't deduce and the doctors won't explain.

Not a word has crossed her lips. Not a single syllable after that first night. The doctors say her vocal cords are still damaged, still swollen, still recovering. She doesn't even have the ability to construct any verbal noise at all. Not a laugh, a grunt, a moan. She's a mime who can only express her opinions through bursts of static air and a notebook which sits by her bedside. He's afraid to leave her alone, because if something happens to her, no one will hear.

She leans into him a bit, the back of her head resting just below his shoulder and her steps slow to half paced. Pure heat undulates from her body, it makes sweat dance on her pallid skin in the hallway lights.

Walking is a trying task. The only physical injury she sustained during the attack is the burn on her neck, but her lungs are still heavy and broken. Dragging her whole body, plus the IV stand tires her out quickly and he knows it's going to be a long time before she's running up twenty flights of stairs wearing the additional weight of the gear.

His arm secures her torso, feeling the rapid rise and decline of her chest as the wheezing starts. His other hand holds the IV stand just under hers to offer support. "Are you okay?"

She nods quickly, four or five times and then gestures to a bench a few steps back. They haven't had to stop on a walk before. He doesn't want to admit what turning back could cost them; how it could destroy the progress they've already scraped together. He knows Jules can do it. She's done it the last two days; he doesn't want to break her spirit or inadvertently cause her to give up. "Your room is two doors away. Do you think you can make it?"

There's a brief pause filled with low asthmatic wheezing and the swift inflation of her chest. She nods, hesitant. "Okay." He kisses her temple and keeps an arm wrapped around her. "Just take it slow, focus on walking. I'll be right here."

Shaky feet shuffle forward in panda slippers. At first she wasn't pleased about their return. Huffing, she shoved them back in the bag and shifted away from him on the bed. When he finally got her to write out what was wrong with them, she elaborated she didn't need a constant reminder of how she was always in the hospital. How she was always screwing up. How she was always failing.

He told her to see benign panda-headed slippers as something that connected them. He bought her first pair because she actually threw up on her original pair of slippers during her original hospital stay. He bought the pandas as a novelty, a laugh, which she did at their little round faces. Together they hobbled many laps around the recovery floor with her toes crinkling painfully within those two pandas. He supported her anyway she would let him. He was ready to give everything up for her then. Did give everything up for her now.

Her room is the next door on the left and her chest begins to spasm underneath his hand. Wheezes and rasps become prolonged, pronounced. She coughs, deep from her diaphragm, a heaving roll from her stomach upwards like she might vomit, like she has something caught in her throat, but she's just trying to breathe. She's still managing to walk in precarious footsteps, mostly because he's pushing her along. He doesn't want to carry her, doesn't want her to make her feel inadequate because he knows she can do this.

When they're at the doorway she coughs, body twisting forward. He hears the wetness, the chemical residue returning. The same crackles he heard rip at her lungs over the comm. link. The wheezes replace themselves with squeaks, air barely escaping her windpipe. That's when he stops caring about her self-confidence and starts caring about her oxygen intake.

He sort of lifts her off the ground with one arm hooking around her torso. Feels all the muscles contort and contract. His other hand drags the IV stand behind them. He sets her on the edge of the bed, her face is red, her skin is combustible and the first tears streak down her cheeks.

"Keep your arms above your head." He pulls her limp limbs away from where she has them fisted against her raucous mouth. He grasps both hands above her but her efforts are fading.

He's about to go get a nurse, when the older one, the one who helped Jules move in a few days ago strides into the room. She must have heard the coughing, or maybe it was just time to change the IV.

"What's going on here?" Her glare is deadly and her crosshairs set on him. She pushes him back with a muscular arm so he's only a spectator from the corner as she sets up the inhaler. "I know it's hard," She rubs Jules' arm reassuringly, waiting for the inhaler to start fuming. "Just try to relax."

"We just went for a walk around the floor. She was getting tired, I should have let her stop—"

Jules shakes her head weakly to disagree with him, wants to know she could have stopped him. Could have made it. He knows they're both only momentarily sidestepping landmines by avoiding talking about what she really is capable of now and in the future. Then again, such a serious conversation deserves her addition of a full vocal rebuttal.

The nurse has her own clashing opinion. "I told you no walks." She hands Jules the inhaler and starts to detangle the oxygen tubes for her nose.

"It was just a short one around the floor—"

"Do you see where it got her?" The nurse sets the plug at Jules nose and curls the tube back around her ears. "Her lungs are shriveled tissue right now."

"I'm sorry I—" He would never do anything to hurt her. He would never say anything to upset her. He thought he was playing to her 'Jules super cop' fantasy by ignoring the visceral warning that told him he was doing the wrong thing. In his sleep deprived world where he's literally drowning in his own concern it's hard to find the balance between appeasing her and himself.

The nurse guides Jules to lie back in the bed with a soft hand on her bicep. In a soothing voice suggests, "Just lie here and try to relax for a second."

Then she sets her sights to him. Her hand is on his bicep, less gentle more controlling, and she directs him to the threshold, brow furrowed. "I know you want to help her, but you pushing her ahead is just going to set her back."

He nods, apologizes again and silently watches the regulation return to Jules' spasmodic chest. The nurse is seemingly appeased by whatever expression he's wearing. Probably one as close to physical ache as he can get without actually incurring any injury. He didn't mean to cause this, God, he didn't mean to cause any of this. The nurse scribbles some rough notes on the chart and leaves.

He sits on the edge of the bed and isn't surprised but still ashamed when Jules' fingers entwine with his. She smiles weakly at him, and shakes her head again, wants him to know it's not his fault when clearly it is. He sighs, purses his lips and tries to remain strong when this whole situation has broken him into such infinitesimal pieces it takes him almost an hour to get home each night. He never remembers where he's going.

He wants to set his head in her lap and just cry. Have her comfort him, even if it's with complete silence because she's soft and full of love and so good at it. She understands him like no one else ever has or ever will. Now, with one vital function subtracted from her, he can't understand what she wants anymore. He's the one who's failing.

When she touches the side of his cheek her hand's scalding and clammy. It's unnatural, he's the warm, she's the cold. He's the summer, she's the winter. It's how they complement each other. The heat is abnormal, just shows how the chemical is gestating within her. He kisses the back of her hand, "You're hot."

She has her eyes closed, but she nods. A few vapors break free from the inhaler and diffuse into the room. Leaning forward, he clears her hair from around her face and neck. Then undoes the first two buttons on his top she's wearing. It still allows her modesty and for her skin to breathe. He uncuffs the sleeves and rolls them up to her elbows. Lifts the hem of the shirt to allow for a little airflow.

She's wearing a man's dress shirt that stops mid-thigh and a pair of sweat pants because the nurse, after he begged her and explained Jules' prior hospital stay, allowed her to be liberated from the gowns. She should look ridiculous, the attire is haphazard, but she looks like the perfect mixture between business and pleasure. He told her this, she mutely laughed.

The bed squeals when he leans forward and places a soft kiss on her lips. She grins when his lips touch hers and her eyelids open slightly. The residual redness, any signs of the chemical is gone and he sighs as he brushes a thumb over her cheek. She's tired, has the right to be, deserves to be.

Her finger caresses the skin under his eyes, probably indicating he too is tired. He's seen the black bags growing each day, the puffy redness from not being able to sleep simply because it doesn't feel right. Anytime he does fall asleep he's awaken by deranged dreams, the kind he's only had in the pits of deep sicknesses. He directs her hand away from his face, kisses the fingertips as a whole. "I'm fine Jules." He's not. She's not. They're not.

Fatigued eyes see straight through his lie and she starts to pull him down. He knows what she wants to do. Try to mimic the pose they sleep in if he's had a particularly bad day. If the subject went awry, or he had to shoot someone he didn't think deserved it, or if he fell a storey and a half off a fire escape and landed on his side in a grimy alley.

"Jules, I don't want to hurt you."

She mouths, 'you won't.' Eyes so full of pain, so full of exhaustion but she still worries about him.

So he dips his head down, still retaining a semi-sitting position, and places an ear to feverish, moist skin on her chest exposed by the buttons he's just relinquished. She drags her fingers through his hair and for a split second he can change the setting and pretend they're at home. Then he hears her heart. Instead of its regular pace, it's tap dancing inside her chest. Shimmying and convulsing from stress and pain.

Despite the shattering of the mirage, he stays like that, using Jules' chest like a seashell, for the next several minutes until the beat steadies itself out with the regulation of her breathing. She's asleep and he detangles her hand from his head. He withdraws to his chair wondering when he's going to tell her what he's done. How he's changed their lives. How an apartment in France and getting a voice back in a different language isn't necessarily a bad thing. Neither is being a Braddock or creating more of them.

Without his realization his eyes start to drift shut. Then shoot open to view Jules still motionless on the bed, inhaler balancing on her bottom lip like a giant cigarette. He grins at the sight and his eyes fall shut again. They stay shut.

* * *

><p>When he reopens his eyes outside has fallen dark, city lights twinkle in the summer night. Jules sits cross-legged on the bed, sweatpants cuffed to the middle of her shin. The inhaler is missing and her teeth bit into her lower lip. Her back rests against a pillow and momentarily he thinks she's watching TV. But she hates TV, forces him to turn it off when he comes to visit. Stares with disapproval, her expression accusing, 'Did you come to visit me or watch TV?'<p>

Then he notices the movement of her fingers, how they fold and weave with a preset tempo. How they're accompanied by a rhythmic clicking. She's knitting his hat, it's actually almost done. When he came back to the hospital and saw the yarn had disappeared he assumed Jules threw it out. She must have hidden it away instead.

He groans, stretching his arms first above his head, then before his body. A loud pop overtakes her docile clicks. She glances sideways at him, a sly smile pulling at the edge of her lips as her fingers work with machine precision. Eyes not even watching as yarn stretches and twirls around pointed tips.

The needles bow and retract and by the time he's beside the bed she's engineered another perfect row. She's really about fifteen minutes from finishing the hat. He'll wear it out of the hospital tonight even though it's August and the temperature lingers near the thirties. If he still worked at the SRU, he'd wear it in because she took the time to make it for him.

"Jeez, how long was I out." He means for it to be a joke, but the gurgle of a sleep complied mucus remains in the back of his throat. She sits up and checks the clock radio on the bedside table. On their first day at the ICU, he told her to think of the room as a hotel suite, just to calm her nerves. She got pissed at him. Wrote in capital letters, 'THIS IS NOT A VACATION!' He only nodded and kissed her forehead because she let him.

Jules waggles five fingers at him, leaning forward and tilting her body to view his reaction. His almost hat rests in her lap.

"Yeah right."He smirks and sits on the side of the bed, watches as she tumbles sideways a little at the impact of his weight. She's put on a little weight, but is still too skinny. He's never told her this, doesn't want her to be self-conscious. Doesn't know if there are old demons to scare up, but doesn't want to chance his big mouth saying the wrong equation of words.

Her eyes roll and he ducks out a smile. Her fingers tap the side of his cheek and direct his vision to the clock face and it reads 9:15. He did sleep for a little over five hours. He rubs at the loitering sleep in his eyes, the puffiness underneath, the dryness within. "I didn't mean to fall asleep." He didn't, but it only makes sense that the best sleep he's gotten since this mess happened is in the same room as Jules, even if it does smell like metal and antiseptic.

She reaches passed him for the notebook on the end table and as her body withdraws back onto the bed he captures her lips. A light kiss, which evolves deep enough to let him taste the deposit of antibiotic mint in her mouth from the inhaler. He laughs and his nose presses against hers in amusement. "You taste like menthol."

There's light scribbling and she shows him a piece of paper which replies, 'you taste like double double'.

"Jules, I told you I didn't get a coffee this morning, I swear." He's lying he did. She's been begging for one, but the nurses say the acid content will hurt her throat. He needed it badly and it was forbidden and tasted so good. Afterwards he brushed his teeth until his gums bled and still she could smell it on him. He's glad he doesn't have the slightest inclination to cheat on her. She would be able to smell it a mile away.

She shakes her head, loose hair covering the pad of gauze pasted to her neck. A few docile coughs escape her throat, and he hands her a cup of water from the table. Just like the nighttime coughs at home. She scribbles something else down and he figures it's about how he's a lying bastard.

'Not that I'm not enjoying the pleasure of your company, but when are you going back to work?'

Shit. It's been five days and he still hasn't told her. Didn't want her to overreact. Hasn't really thought of a way to tell her without her overacting. Jules isn't like any ordinary woman. He can't just tell her that he wants to sweep her away to France, marry her and start a family and expect her to be all for it. She's going to argue, voiceless or not, and he's going to need to have a defensive rebuttal. And defensive hands.

Her eyes watch him. Staring, waiting for her answer. When he doesn't respond, she checks the writing to see if she's made a mistake. Then her eyes widen and she frantically scribbles, 'No one else was hurt, right?'

"No. No, everyone's fine Jules." She's been writing him notes asking where everyone else from the team was. In all honesty he hasn't had the time or the mentality to call them and let them know she's out of decontamination. Then again, they probably know and they're staying away for his sake. Or their own. "I'm not going back."

The Band-Aid is off in one swift movement and he watches as her eyes squint in miscomprehension. 'Did you take vacation days?'

"No Jules, I quit." Her hands fall flat on the notebook. Head tilting to the side trying to gauge his words and their validity. When he doesn't elaborate she shakes her head so much he thinks she's going to have a seizure. "Jules it was either me or you. Toth wanted one of us gone and the other suspended—"

She coughs, weak at first, but a loud grating one croaks free. It hurts his ears. "Jules, listen." He stands, and places a hand on each shoulder trying to get her to lie back in the bed. "It's going to be fine."

Her body is shaking and she's wheezing a little between quieting breaths. He wants to go get a nurse, but there's a tug on his arm. 'What are you going to do?'

"I was thinking about taking that job overseas. The one in France." And the expression on her face crushes what's left of his spirit. She coughs, the movement rattling her ribs, tears in her eyes though maybe not from the pain. "Hey. Hey. Jules." He places a hand on the back of her neck, lifts her hair. "I want you to come with me."

An eyebrow arches at him through the coughs now being muffled by her fist. He manages a smile while tying back her hair. "This is our opportunity to actually be together." She tries to write, grasping the notebook but her hands are shaking too much, body racked with coughs.

He knows what she's going to say. That they were together before when she was an SRU officer and didn't have to deal with all this shit. "Jules please, just listen to me. You're going to need time off to recover. Take it with me in France. Or with me wherever, I don't care about the job, because I know my future is you. I see myself marrying you. Having kids with you."

Fingers tightly grasp his as she inhales in a deep shudder. When she coughs, it sounds painful, murderous, like egg shells crushing. The second time she hacks, it's deeper, diaphragm warping and something projects from her mouth. During his first ICU visit with her she coughed up orange colored phlegm from the chemical. He figures it's that, only it's not.

There's splatter of blood on his almost finished hat. Twin ribbons dangling from her mouth as her chest hyperventilates, accordions with the need for oxygen. With each intensifying cough, more blood pours out, seemingly endless as she hemorrhages from the inside.

"Oh my God." He shoves her back on the bed, while his thumb smashes into the call button. They were told only to use it in case of emergencies. She's still coughing and the sticky blood is sliding down her chin and onto her neck. "Keep your arms up."

He's trying to show her how to breathe, while simultaneously wiping the blood from her face and breaking the call button when the nurse finally shows up. She shares in his, "Oh my God," and calls for a doctor. The medical staff start pouring in and he's thrust into a corner. The same corner. A passive observer. Body numb and covered in viscous blood.

* * *

><p>An hour later he's sitting outside of radiology in the waiting room. It's almost eleven and strangely enough there's no one else in the room. The news plays mutely on an old overhanging TV and in the corner is a stack of kids' toys that are most likely diseased. He's out here because they wouldn't let him through the last set of double doors. Something about the radiation and how he shouldn't be too close. He got the metaphor.<p>

Jules was under sedation; they got her breathing on her own but needed to know where the blood was coming from. The doctor needed x-rays of her lungs to make sure it wasn't pooling there. If it was, she'd need a chest tube. First an incision, then a metal instrument would separate her ribs, then they'd shove another tube in her to drain the blood. He hopes it's not that, but his army boy medical knowledge only gets him so far and his brain is too muddled with worry and hurt to think straight.

They removed him from her room because he was frantic. Insane over the fact his words, words he meant to carve their future together caused her to stop breathing and cough up blood. Never a good sign on the relationship horizon. The male nurse shoved him out and said something about just letting them help her.

They aren't helping her. She's been here a week and hasn't said a word. He knows her attitude is all a show and he tries not to let it get to him. Tries not to think about how she acts when he's not around. Tries not to think she's anything other than the stubborn, tenacious Jules he knows. This place is going to break her.

The doctor exits the mythological doors and immediately he's on his feet. The other man wears a somber expression and he hopes that's just the way the guy normally looks. "The good news is there's no evidence of blood in her lungs."

He doesn't consider this a victory, because if there's good news than there has to be bad news. He crosses his arms, licks his bottom lip and tries to prepare himself for the very worse. But he can't. He can't even fathom what he would do if they told him she was—he can't even think it. His voice cracks,"But?"

"But," the doctor sighs and pushes his horned-rimmed glasses up on his face. "The blood is coming from her throat. The chemical burned it—"

"You said it was healing."

"It is healing, that's the problem. Like the burn on her neck, it's blistering and that's closing her airway making it hard to breathe. The coughs and wheezes rip open the blisters which cause blood."

He exhales loudly, wipes at the tremble in his upper lip. "So what do we do?"

"Every time she coughs she's undoing the healing process."

His hands cover his face. He already doesn't like where this is going. "What are you suggesting?"

"I'd like to put her in a medically induced coma for a few days just until—"

"No." He shakes his head and turns away. Almost laughs away the idea. Purposely hurting Jules, keeping her in this place when all she wants to do is go home to her house with her things. Have a shower in her bathroom. Sleep in her own bed. "No."

"She needs to recover the use of her throat. Her lungs are weak as it is. If she crashes she'll be put in one anyway—"

"The inhaler was working."

"The inhaler is only for short term pain relief. We need her body to heal itself."

"Did you ask her?"

"She's unconscious right now and you're her emergency contact."

He exhales loudly into the room again. The news flickers off the walls giving the room a blue hue. His mouth hides behind his fisted hand, afraid of the words he might speak. "If she goes under, that means a feeding tube again."

"Yes."

"That means her being intubated again."

"We'd most likely do a tracheotomy to bypass the throat."

His head shakes, blue and white dash back and forth in his vision. He stares up at the ceiling hands clasped on the back of his head and wonders what the fuck he did to be punished like this. To have Jules just constantly go through shit with him on the sidelines deciding her fate. If he says no she'll be happy, but might not be healthy. If he says yes, she'll wake up on a respirator again and flip the fuck out when she realizes she lost days and he was the one who took them from her. It might cause the death of their relationship.

Then he remembers the reason why she's in this mess in the first place. He had all the time in the world to intervene. To speak up and tell her not to go into the office. To wait for him and Raf to back her up. Could have said literally a thousand things which would have resulted in her saying a thousand things now, but was afraid it would cost him his relationship and his job. He only has one of those now. Even if she leaves him, at least he knows he did the right thing this time.

"Mr. Braddock, I need an answer."

"Put her in the coma." He whispers to the ground as macabre images of him spending the next few days beside a machine creating more noise than she does flood through his head. "But intubate her."

"If we don't do the trach—"

"Doc, there's no way in hell you're sticking a tube in her neck."

"Fair enough." The doctor nods and ambles away through the gateway to heaven. "I'll get the consent forms."

He falls back into one of the cushion-less chairs with a hybrid arm made of metal and plastic. Something bunches in his back pocket and he pulls out the almost finished hat. When they kicked him out of the room, he still had it in his hands. In the blur he doesn't remember what happened to Jules' knitting needles. He hopes they didn't have sentimental value.

The thick yarn knitted so tightly with her expertise and her love now falls slightly loose from the premature removal from the needles. The billiard-sized splat of her blood dried an accosting maroon color and the curvy edges protrude over soft wool. He tries to think of the future, tries to envision the same thoughts he had before of himself and Jules, but now they're unclear.

The doctor brings him two identical pieces of paper to sign along with a black pen. He scribbles his names over the appropriated spots and initials where told too. The doctor touches his shoulder and mumbles some comforting words, but he feels like he's just signed a death certificate.

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - The final chapter. It's very different from the rest. Ironic and fluffy and angsty and I'm sure everyone will be pissed. <em>


	5. Domestic Bliss

_A/N: Okay so in case you haven't been following my Twitter, basically I've been doing finals. That and the original chapter 5 ended up being 30 pages and 16,000+ words. I thought it was a lot to take in at once and reading it all at once wouldn't put emphasis on moments that needed it. So instead you now get chapters 5,6,7,8,9 and 10. I know. I'm a machine. The good thing is the whole first draft to the story is done so you get updates while I work on Just-World. The bad thing is I sense everyone wanting a sequel because as my lovely SYuuri says "you're not good at resolution endings". And I'm not. I'm also known to crumble to mob demands when it comes to literature, so if enough of you ask for a sequel, I might do it.  
>That being said I dedicate these last chapters to the lovely SYuuri because they were semi-written with her wants in mind (and way pre-finale I might add). A little bit of what she wishes she could see with my deviancy weaved in makes for a great story, hence the 30 pages.<br>On to the technical business, the story changes quite frequently from here on out. I don't want to ruin it but basically there's a lot of chronological jumps (meaning cut scenes).  
>Lastly, thanks to everyone who reviewedfavorited/alerted and of course read. And thanks for your patience. I'll try to get a new chapter up every 3 days or so._

__Aphonous

Chapter 5/10

Domestic Bliss

The room is blue. The light blue that radiates from behind the screens of old TVs long after they've been flicked off. No, it's maroon, the color of rich coffee, healthy earth and dried blood. Blinking lethargically the room solidifies as hunter green, the color of honeymoons zip lining by. The color of the army. Well, in Canada. Maybe in France too.

There are two windows off to the left; both have the blinds drawn, but they glow with the ethereal life of downtown. A monitor stands creating mountains out of her heartbeats. A beep repeats itself almost every second, what should be silence between is filled by a sibilant hiss.

This is when she notices she's not breathing for herself. Her lungs are paper bags, being inflated by some six-year-old bully who could choose to gather the trapped air and smash it against an open chubby palm. It's like those meditating moments when she realizes she's breathing and then can't let her breaths become a submissive action. She hates the feeling of this tube carjacking her mouth open, the roughness of it on her lips, the sound of it, the blue accordion mechanism that sighs as it fills her lungs.

Her head is immobile, her whole body is. It's heavy with sleep, with weakness, with pain. It's burdened with wires and tubes of all sizes. The feeding tube is back in the cavern of her right nostril, slithered back to where it was just excavated. There's at least six electrodes hidden somewhere on her body if there's a heart monitor. They're a pain too, sticky as hell and always leave little red round hickeys on her skin.

As the acoustics in her ears begin to clear, a faint mumbling can be heard over the mechanical wonderland set up around her bed. Her irises slide sideways to the right side of the room where Sam hunches over in a chair. His hands clasped at his bowed head and he's muttering something into his wrists. After a few seconds of his monologue, her ears pick up a few verses from a prayer and it's surprising. He's not a religious person. Neither of them are. Sunday mornings are spent lazing around in bed until ten or when one of them has the mentality to break the domestic bliss and start the day.

His elbows balance on his knees as he sort of rocks back and forth. She wants to get his attention, but his eyes are wrenched close like he's expecting to reopen them and not be in Oz anymore. He's less than a foot away, but she can't reach out and touch him. Her arm might as well be two tons of steel. The best effort results in a twitch of her right index finger. After a few more seconds of watching him she has to close her eyes. Is she really worth the prayer?

Her feet might have a better chance to garner his attention. A foot is larger, moves like a shark fin under the sheets. She detaches her right foot from where it's married to her left, the soles unionized. She doesn't bother trying to stand it on the heel; instead she drags it a few inches under the covers. The starch on the sheet and static cling of the wooly blanket cause friction and compose the lightest of sounds.

Really he should hear it. He can shoot people from kilometers away, smell C4, but can't hear his girlfriend trying to get him to notice her from inches away. She feels like she's been hit by a truck. There's solidity in her chest not caused by the foreign inflation. In one final attempt she spring loads her leg and then releases all the muscles to let out the smallest, weakest kick she's ever witnessed. Fetal kicks have more impact.

But Sam notices it. Head bobs up from his religious sabbatical. His facial features are slack. Eyebrows even. Eyes red, dark eclipsed and puffy as hell. Nostrils unflinching as they gulp in steady breathes. His lips remain pursed as his hands hover in the air. "Jules."

Her half or quarter drugged eyes must be what he was praying for because he laughs aloud. His eyes become crescents and he kisses her forehead while he smoothes out her hair. "God Jules, you had me so scared."

She can only watch him. A passive bystander in the life he's set up. She doesn't even know how she ended up like this. The last thing she remembers is Sam breaking the call button. She loves him, knows she does in the way his strong hand holds hers up. He kisses her palm, breath warm and comforting. "You've been out for three days. They tried to wake you up last night and it didn't take."

Oh so the prayer was for a summer revival. A little late in the season if she remembers her basic theology, but it seemingly worked. She twitches her hand towards her mouth and the giant abomination sticking out of it. She'd like that gone.

"You'll probably have to keep that for another day."

She wants to roll her eyes, but just doesn't have the energy.

"Your lungs were weak and your throat was swelling. They asked me for permission to put you in a coma and—"

And he did_._ She wants to sigh but can't. The most basic and trivial of sarcastic rhetorics are a delicacy to her now. She'll have to work out something with her eyebrows. However many days ago, she started using bits of the sign language she remembered from high school, but it pissed Sam off. He told her she'd speak again and learning to adapt was learning to give up in this situation.

"Jules, please." He's trapped her limp, cold, corpse of a hand between his two radiating ones. His top lip touches on her index finger and calmness surges through her. Something so normal evokes something so extraordinary. "Please don't be mad at me. I love you and I just wanted you to get better. I just, I couldn't lose you."

She closes her eyes for a moment, feels his thumbs caressing her knuckles and she wonders how she would feel if the situation was reversed. If Sam was in the hospital bed and she was the doting lover with a numb ass. She knows if the doctors didn't do everything in their power to save him, that she would hunt every single one of them down and make them suffer. Make it painful, make it last.

Her hand drunkenly stumbles through the air trying to touch his cheek. He understands, grasps her hand and holds it to the side of his face. It's warm, but sunken from the days withdrawn from sleep, or just armchair sleep. There's also an obscene amount of stubble and she crinkles her nose at it. He chuckles in response and kisses the tip of her thumb. A nonverbal resolution.

* * *

><p>The transition is smooth, without turbulence. Without a word, a syllable, even a jostle from cob webbed vocal cords in the back of her throat that feel sticky and itchy. The apartment is very modern, very clean, gleaming even. And very white. All the walls are white, bedroom, bathroom, kitchen. It reminds her of the hospital. All she can think is how the hell are the walls supposed to stay this white?<p>

As per Sam's new contract, the military set them up with a not too shabby one bedroom apartment in a building about fifteen minutes from the base. He's spending the year teaching fresh-faced French teens how to Sierra shoot someone. While she does shit all.

The first month is acceptable, maybe even borderline exhilarating. A new city and a new language she can't speak even if she wants to. The Hat didn't exactly have an abundance of French speaking Canadians and it was just easier to take the sign language option for a year which is so ironic it's almost sad. Sam speaks French fluently of course, which is why his dad was able to secure the position for him.

Sam gets up at five in the morning and by the time he's out of the shower she's standing at the bathroom door ready to hand him a cup of coffee. She can't do much else, and God knows she doesn't want to be reduced to a single domesticated stereotype, but he still appears so tired. Gray bags piled on top of his cheekbones and premature wrinkles shadowing the rest of his face. Most days he comes home looking worse and she just holds him at the door, his breath hot in staccato puffs against the nape of her neck. She wonders what actually goes on at the base, knows he's still in basic training, training to be a trainer, and she doesn't want to interfere. Has a feeling that she's his oasis.

The lack of a vocal structure hinders her from doing a lot of things when Sam's not home. She can't go shopping. She did at first, but one day the clerk kept asking her questions. Questions she couldn't answer. Questions in French. It's not like she could make a cutting or strangling motion to her throat, people might construe it as threatening. Might think she's choking.

So she and Sam go together. Walk once a week, usually Tuesdays, to the little grocery store a few streets over. He still tries to zoom by the vegetables, she has to drag him back with both hands and pull out vegetables high in vitamins. Then find creative ways to hide them in his food to make sure the big idiot eats right.

The streets are cobblestoned and built cozy close together. Houses and buildings loom over thin streets and when it rains, the water veins between the ancient stones, trickles downhill and into the river. The city is nothing like Toronto, paved and cemented shut. It rains a lot more, and she leaves the windows open to the placating sound. Rain on the roof, wind in the leaves, water on the beach.

During the days she uses her cell phone to send Sam uplifting messages. She's not good at texting or technology, but she needs to get used to it. Or learn to speak again. She uses his laptop while he's at work. Has searched it top to bottom for porn and found none, not that she could bitch him out for it, she was in the hospital for over a month. She sends an email to update the Team on their new France lives. Sarge writes back within the hour and she wonders what the hell time it is in Toronto.

She waits impatiently for the nights. Cooking supper for an exhausted Sam who talks to her about everything, anything to fill her speechless void. Just sitting next to him on the couch while he frantically searches to find if there's a TV channel broadcasting Canadian hockey. Her foot knocking the remote in his hand every few seconds until he growls her name in a warning.

The luxury of being able to sleep next to him. After weeks of being separated by injuries, tubes, wires and one particularly overprotective nurse, she can finally just lie down with him at night. Fall asleep with his arms ensconcing her, body warm, fingers brushing her skin with a feather light texture mollifying her constantly worrying mind.

He whispers things to her as they fall asleep. Anecdotes about his childhood and his father's cruelty, his mother's crushed spirit, his other sister's addiction problems. Stories that if they were in Toronto would still need another year or two to gestate before he spoke them. But here he lies facing her, hand brushing through her hair, dancing over her cheek as he regales her with stories of his army upbringing to bridge the communication defect between them.

* * *

><p>At three months in she actually thinks time has stopped because the sky stays the same cotton white during the day and night, swollen with an impending snowfall. She doesn't want to complain to Sam, who's starting to enjoy his job. His probationary period is ending, which means a little increase in pay, but they still decide to have a modest Christmas.<p>

Everything about the Christmas is modest. The tree they buy is fake, plastic and the size of a garbage can because there's no use in investing in something when in nine months they're going back to Canada. She's adamant about it. She wants her house back from Natalie, who was sideswiped when Sam suddenly told his sister he'd sold his apartment. Feeling sorry and slightly responsible, she communicated to Nat that her house was open, but she needed to keep the place up. And not move any of the furniture. Or wreck the floors. Or paint the walls. Sam still doesn't know how he ended up with a purple guest room.

She didn't cook much on Christmas. She's furious with peering out the same stupid window above the sink as hands robotically wash dishes and her body, like her throat, doesn't feel a thing. As a concession, she and Sam also agree not to buy each other gifts. Between paying the mortgage on her house back home and trying to stay afloat here during his probationary pay period, money is too tight for gifts.

But she buys him something anyway. Because fuck it, it's Christmastime and they've had a ridiculously stupid year climaxing at her chemical inhalation and somehow they ended up in France and it's weird. She needs to convey emotions she can't speak to Sam, and it's a way to ground her in this backwards, cheese loving culture. So one day when he's at work, she actually leaves the house for something other than a brisk walk. She goes to a small store and buys yarn. White yarn, fatter and softer than the kind he bought before. She also splurges for new knitting needles because to this day, neither of them knows where her old ones went. She wishes the panda slippers went with them.

On Christmas Eve they sit on a rented couch in front of their knee-high Christmas tree drinking really awful watered-down beer. She balances her beer bottle on his thigh as her temple rests against the side of his chin. His arm circles her body to cup her knee. He gives it a weak shake and with a sigh expresses, "This is weird right?"

She nods. It is weird. It's the first Christmas they've really spent together. Last year Sam went back to B.C. with Natalie to see his parents and she spent it alone. It sounds tragic, but Christmases usually end up more tragic when she spends them with someone, especially family. Now suddenly they're living on the other side of the world together, she's completely cut off from the only other family she knew and it's starting to get serious. If she actually realized how serious it was before this point, she might have run.

Before they go to bed, she twitches her nose at the sink full of dishes. Not at the task at hand, but at the stupid fucking window that reminds her of the windows in the hospital. Windows in a psychiatric ward. Windows in a prison. Sam approaches her from behind and wraps and arm around her shoulders pulling her back towards him. Pressing a kiss into her hair, he laughs, "I'll do them tonight."

These are the times she's sure it's true love. He doesn't know why she doesn't want to do the dishes, only she doesn't want to them. Even if she had a voice, she's sure she wouldn't share her secret hatred of the window, but Sam would still volunteer to do the dishes. When he's done she sets a small wrapped gift on the table, white bag with golden tissue paper exploding from within.

"Jules." He shakes his head. "I thought we said no gifts."

She purses her lips and shrugs. He did the dishes, it's an even exchange.

She watches his expression elevate as he realizes what the gift is. The way his eyes light up when he holds the stupid hat in his hands. She honestly tried to make it as ugly as she could, because now she has a feeling that he'll ask her to knit other things using the same method. Ask for mittens and then not wear anything on his hands all winter. Then a sweater and just waltz around topless.

The hat is white with two strings trailing down the sides almost reminiscent of early pilot gear. She also created this huge horrible pompom for the top. But Sam loves it. Laughs and immediately places it on his head like it's a crown. "You always know the right size."

She should, she's fallen asleep with that humongous head resting on her chest too many times to count in the last three months.

"How does it look?"

He looks ridiculous. If they were back at the SRU everyone would get a piece of him. She would even dig in and she made the damn thing. But his mood is so delighted, he's almost blissful. It makes the hat less ludicrous and her love him more. She pulls down on the side strings and kisses him.

"Hey," he mumbles against her lips, hat strings tickling her cheeks. "I have something for you too."

She pulls away slightly, staring at him with narrow eyes. Mr. No-Presents indeed. He reaches to the top shelf of the cupboard and she wonders silently why she didn't think to clean more. She could have found his gift. Maybe with a few days worth of plotting, figured out how to slyly un and rewrap it.

The paper is white with silvery glittering snowflakes on it and a small silver bow. "It's something I think we should do."

She really hopes he means cleaning the upper cabinets and her eyes twitches with a tad of anxiety. Inside is a Christmas tree ornament. A small glass angel holding a wreath. 'Year One' is engraved across the wings.

"I figured we could get one every Christmas."

She only nods, trying to keep the emotions from bursting out of her eyes and all over his beautiful gift. Her lower lip trembles and she sets the ornament on the table as she hugs him. Nine more months is tolerable. She can do nine more months.

He chuckles in her ear and apparently she's not catching on to something. When she examines his face again, he's wearing that stupid lopsided smile which means he's most likely going to do something to ruin this moment. "Did you notice the wreath?"

Of course she noticed the wreath. She's not an idiot. She doesn't nod, only so he won't gloat later on, but picks up the angel to investigate it once more. And that's when she really sees what the wreath is. A ring.

And she stares like an idiot because she wants to ask him so many questions that need to be verbal and not penned. Are you serious? Why now? Are you kidding me? You do not expect me to get married in France, do you? You're joking right? Her eyes bulge and dry with the pressure of not being able to ask. Not being able to properly answer.

"I know you hate it here Jules." And she fucking hates him because he's so goddamn calm. Like this is the most natural thing in the world. Like committing himself to her for an eternity is something he doesn't blink an eye at but he'll spend thirty fucking minutes picking out the right cut of meat. "But that's the thing with engagements; they can last a long time. They can last until you're ready."

She doesn't say anything because she can't. Even if she could, she's pretty sure she would be screaming at him right now in an only somewhat misplaced rage. For the first time she's glad she doesn't have a voice. Her hands start to sweat around the angel. The wings burrow and leave imprints on her skin.

"You don't have to answer now." He holds out his hand and with a little hesitancy she places the angel on his palm. There's an ache in her chest because it feels like he didn't give her enough time to decide.

"I just know I want to spend the rest of my life with you." His fingers deftly work against the ornament and he frees the ring. It's white gold with a single diamond resting in the middle. She remembers sitting in some fancy restaurant about six months ago when Sam started asking her about rings. What color she liked more. How her stomach hardened and the food on her fork splattered back onto her plate. She was terrified he might propose then. Suddenly it isn't so scary.

"I just don't think my life could get any better than you putting on this ring."

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - The bipolar chapter. <em>


	6. Divorcing Definition

_A/N: Very quick note. Jules views of France are not my own. It's a story. I Mean no harm. Also my French is bad. Also very tired from a long day of traveling so please excuse any mistakes.  
>Also thanks to everyone who reviewedfavorited/alerted and of course read. I'll try to get the next chapter up within three days, but I have to Christmas cook myself into submission so we'll see.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 6

Divorcing Definitions

And nothing changes. She always thought an engagement ring sliding down her fourth finger would be the equivalent to handcuffs. But Sam somehow only manages to make her love him more. Six months into their French adventure and three months into their engagement he still gets up at five. Sometimes she cooks him breakfast and makes coffee. Sometimes he picks her out of bed and carries her into the shower with him.

Once he laments because she can't squeal. Apparently she used to squeal? Under the refreshing pulse of the showerhead she gives him crooked eyebrows and he elaborates. "You didn't used to do it often, that's why I liked it. It was a challenge to get you to do it."

Then a sudden sadness sideswipes her and she's unable to meet his eyes. She wonders how he can deal with her. With a mute girlfr—fiancée. Always having to guess her moods, guess her thoughts. Guess if she's sick or just tired. Wake up to her ordinary whooping coughs with an expression of sheer terror on his face. A lifetime of charades.

He brushes her bangs back from her face and kisses her softly on the lips. In a voice barely above a whisper, he shares with her like it's their secret, "You'll get your voice back again, Jules."

This optimism is the reason why Sam refuses to let her even dabble in the alternatives. He refuses to learn a single thing about sign language. Refuses to let her carry around a card which states 'je ne peux pas parler' so that when shop keepers and people do ask her the random question she doesn't come off as insane. Instead she's left with a writer's hand cramp, text fingers and Carpal Tunnel syndrome. None of the French doctors can give them a reason why she can't talk. Vocal cords now look healthy and plump but she still can't orchestrate a single sound. Not even a squeal.

Despite a shiny new ring, things go downhill for her fast. Depression cripples. In the middle of March she has random breakdowns inside the apartment. Starts to cry because she hates the building and the other tenants who debase her with expressions of disgust. They're loud; they throw too many parties and play the worst music. She misses her big house. She built, primed and painted those walls. She fixed the plumbing. She put in perennials last year and never got to see them bloom. She wants to see her fucking garden. Natalie probably hasn't watered them and—she misses Natalie.

She sends an email to the Team through Sarge telling them of her and Sam's impending intent to marry. She sends it after the engagement is three months old. Something about telling four grown men about her engagement the exact moment it happens is disconcerting, disturbing, and saddening. Sarge replies back in nine days. His spelling is off and his words are jumbled. She wonders again what time it is in Toronto when he wrote the email. Then spends time wondering if he's been kidnapped and this is a secret message to decode.

At night she lies beside Sam, her eyes ruby red with too many tears and too much evaded sleep. Stares at the stucco waves in the ceiling as the old French couple who live above them play the TV too loud. A morbid part of her contemplates if that's her future. Living with Sam in this stupid French town for the rest of her life while Natalie just inherits her house. Not often, only sometimes, the old Jules resurfaces and she thinks of leaving. Just scribbling a note, hailing a cab to the airport, and going back to Toronto.

The relationship isn't the problem. She and Sam understand each other; have learned through her foibles to make concessions for each other. When they do have fights, which are a common occurrence because they're both still stubborn, they resolve them quickly. They've made too many and too great of sacrifices for each other to stay angry.

They're still intimate. Still have sex quite frequently despite the fact she's uncomfortably soundless. She wondered how he could, because the silence evokes awkwardness in her and it's her silence. She can't even moan. After the first few clumsy times she wanted to play music to drown out the sound of smacking lips and skin. He wouldn't let her, told her it was a shared moment between them. He was still the same person; she was still the same person. Nothing had changed regardless of what she thought. He told her she was all he wanted, all her would ever need. After that it was easy.

She glances at Sam so peacefully asleep beside her. He loves her. Loves her way too much and it's terrifying. He mumbles something, lips motoring facedown into the pillow. He throws his arm heavily, randomly over her hips. She holds it there because she loves him too. Knows she does because if this France situation was with anyone else she'd be gone by now. Six more months out of her life is nothing considering what he's forfeited for her. Rehabilitating her after a bullet fragmented her body. Voicing her opinion because she cannot.

* * *

><p>In the last week of March they're in the grocery store and she's exhausted. Mentally, physically, emotionally. It's getting hard to put on the June Cleaver face every time Sam returns home from the base with a brand new a story to tell and she's spent all day locked in the bathroom sobbing silently perched on the toilet seat.<p>

Of course he strides by the vegetables, while she languidly pushes the cart five feet behind him. Trying to stay upright. Trying to figure out what meals to cook where he won't scrunch up his face when he notices the side dishes. Trying to listen to him ramble about how in a few months he'll be showing recruits the rudimentary points of bomb dismantling as he rounds a corner and leaves her alone in the aisle. Trying not to be jealous because he still gets this exciting life with supposedly everything, while her major challenge is dinner ideas. She bows her head into her hand because there's welling in her eyes and she refuses to cry in the grocery store.

After five minutes he pops back from around the corner. She's too late in detecting him to change her stature. His hand is warm and strong on her back. His voice next to her ear, soft with pricks of concern. "Are you okay?"

She swallows. Nods while furiously blinking away the residual tears in her eyes. She gestures to the vegetables and hopes he just disappears like he usually does. Spending the entire trip trapped in the frozen food or meat aisle. They come all the way to France and miss the meager ways of Toronto living.

Instead he strolls along the row of vegetables, stopping to retrieve a head of spinach, and brings the vegetable to her. It's big, glistening with straining drops of synthesized dew. Hunter green. "Spinach is high in B vitamins and iron—" and he continues to repeat the stupid speech she'd have to recite to him every single time they'd go grocery shopping. He can't survive on a diet of just red meat.

The vegetable ends up in the cart even though she knows he hates it. While he's suggesting they have a salad she breaks. Crumbles and decays like a rotting leaf. Fingers shake against the handlebar of the cart and she starts to breathlessly sob. He pulls her hands free and crushes her against his chest, protecting her from any prying eyes in the store.

* * *

><p>Since she can no longer deny her state of mind to him, they have what constitutes as a 'discussion' back at the apartment. They sit on the lumpy couch, laptop teetering on his knee as she types out her feelings. How she loves him so much, but this place is killing her. Sucking the life out of her. How the kitchen window makes her feel like Napoleon in exile. How everything she love but him is back in Toronto.<p>

He holds her hand, twirls the engagement ring on her finger and kisses the crown of her head. She glances up at him for an answer, a solution. But she doesn't think Sam can find a way to fix it, to assure her that this place is slightly tolerable. "I was going to surprise you, but I have three days off coming up in two weeks."

After the probation period ended, Sam's work hours shifted to six days a week. They're normal eight hour days, but the one day weekend only adds to the strain. It's an extra day she has to spend alone within four white walls. An extra day she has to spend submerged in silence. "I could fly home with you and then come right back."

Her eyes widen and she stares at him to gauge if this is an actual suggestion. If it is, it's the dumbest thing he's ever said.

"We can handle six months apart Jules. We can send emails or—"

Or nothing because their communication is limited to the written word unless he wants to pay long distance to listen to static on the other end of the phone. She intertwines her fingers with his playing with her ring. Shakes her head.

"Jules, this year is for you to recover. You can't recover if you're stressing yourself out."

Shifting her body she sits halfway in his lap, arms tightly hugging his body to hers. He doesn't understand, if she goes home, that's it. Six months might as well be a year. Might as well be the rest of their lives, because something is bound to intercept them. Her choices are returning back to Toronto to contentment but without Sam, or remaining in France depressed as hell but with Sam. She's already decided.

"Jules, just—"

She shakes her head a final time. Squeezes him so he knows he's lost the conversation. She's not going anywhere. The next time they get one a plane, it will be in six months, and they'll both land and remain in Toronto. If he flew home with her, and then left she might spiral down further.

"Okay." His face rests against her collarbone and his hand trails up and down her spine.

* * *

><p>Two weeks later, it's halfway through April. A Wednesday, rainy but it's the first day in the three Sam has off. On the date she could have been flying over the Atlantic Ocean heading back to Toronto, her house, Tim Horton's which she still hasn't had since being hospitalized, she and Sam go to the town hall. They're married in a civil ceremony. It takes less than an hour, Sam has to translate some things for her and all four witnesses are people she doesn't even know.<p>

The wedding is her idea. Sam's actually surprised but she figures who the hell are they going to invite? The team they tore apart? His tyrannical father, weeping mother and hysterical sister? Her testosterone infused abusive family? This was a huge event in their lives, why couldn't it be something they just shared together. She thinks the fact she hadn't been planning her wedding since she was seven wasn't as surprising as the fact she was the one who suggested the marriage.

She wears a dress. Not a traditional wedding dress, because money is tight and they only have a few days and she doesn't really care enough to fret over not having the iconic attire. Instead she buys a white cocktail dress from a boutique. Tries on a few before Sam stands from the armchair he slumped into when they entered the store. She learned early on in their relationship unless it was for lingerie, he hates going clothing shopping. The dress has a tiny plunge in the neckline as is the current fashion. The sleeves drape over her arms and the billowing hem stops a few inches past her knees.

"That's the one."

He wears a dress shirt and slacks. There's no reason he should have to dress up in a tux if she's not going traditional wedding. She vetoes the military wear too, because this is a personal event. She doesn't need a reminder of why they're stuck in France or what she's marrying into.

Basically the ceremony consists of them staring at each other for an hour as the mayor reads things in French she doesn't understand. Sam watches her with cautious eyes; maybe he's waiting for her to examine the door, waiting for her to run. She's waiting for herself to run but she can't.

Before the ceremony Sam surprised her with a small potted plant, one that just started to bud. When she raised an eyebrow at him, like he might have taken an extra hard hit at work yesterday, he pushed the plant into her arms. "I know you hate flowers, but Jules come on, you need a bouquet."

So in what might be the weirdest thing the mayor has ever seen, she stands facing Sam. Holds one of his hands within hers, and with her free hand coddles a terracotta pot to her chest because sometimes Sam takes things a little too literally. She has the rest of her life to figure out just how often he does.

After dropping the plant off at home, they keep their clothes and head out to a fancy restaurant for supper. She points out what she wants for supper and Sam orders for both of them. They have wine, which is a lot better than the beer and Sam keeps throwing out suggestions on what to do with their two free days. This evening is a welcome change to her being chained to the kitchen, peering out the window, but the noise level of their table falters in comparison to the rest of the restaurant and the pithy jazz music hanging over the ambiance.

Back at the apartment she bends at the waist, prying off her slingbacks. They topple to the floor and the arches of her feet ache from a day of inappropriate footwear. While pressing her thumb into the tense muscles, she glances over her shoulder to check on Sam because he's dangerously void of verbal or tactile sounds.

He's leaning against the living room wall. His leer is completely focused on her, lust filled eyes half-lidded and eyebrows low as his tongue peeks out to wet his lips. Even without words it's obvious what he's thinking. "I know we have to wait for a honeymoon."

Neither of them really seemed to care about the fact they had to wait for a true honeymoon. For extreme hiking, remote trails and no outhouses. In all honestly she thinks they'd both rather go back to Canada then some other country. "But it is our wedding night after all."

She straightens out her back and rolls her eyes. So predictable. But she slinks towards him wearing a seductive smile.

So they consummate the marriage, even though they've consummated the relationship too many times to count. Pre-consumated the marriage the night before in fact. "Just in case," Sam suggested. Without music, just the two of them and the garbled transmission of the elderly couple's TV upstairs.

In the morning she wakes to find him playing with her rings. She has two now, both on her fourth finger. Both white gold and modestly set. He only has one. She's winning. He kisses her hand and lets her fingers splay across his bare chest. "I can't believe we're married."

She still can't believe she took his name willingly. But then examines the alternative of keeping her father's surname. He never wanted her, never loved her. Sure in her lifetime she's done things to gain self pride. To prove herself over again and make the name her own, but it would always stem from the same hateful man. Always have the same origin no matter how much she changed the definition. Having to change every single piece of government identification once they move back to Canada is worth it. Sam is the opposite. Always exudes adoration. Always wants her. Always loves her.

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - I'm willing to bet a lot of you can guess what's next. <em>


	7. Positive

_A/N: Only a short chapter this time guys, but it packs a wallop. To answer some commonly asked questions: the one sided conversations pan out so well because a) I wrote another story for another fandom where a character didn't talk. Although it was when I was young and viral and it's so bad haha. b) I'm not a talker. It's much easier to do from Jules POV, but I only switched perspectives because I was getting sick of triple writing Sam (I'm writing him for Just-World too and for another story. After awhile I need a break). The team will reappear before chapter 10. And for those of you waiting for Jules to talk, remember the name of the story.  
>Again, thanks to those who took the time to reviewfavorite/alert and of course read. I know things are especially hectic around this time of year (I JUST did my Christmas shopping) so the next time I can barricade myself in my room and pull myself away from Just-World, I'll update.  
>Lastly, this chapter goes out especially to SYurri. Hopefully this will bring her out of her bad day because I wrote it kinda just for her.<br>_

Aphonous

Chapter 7

Positive_  
><em>

Two months later she's back in the sanctuary of the locked bathroom. Last night she and Sam had their first spat as a married couple. She's honestly amazed they made it a full two months without a single altercation. She wanted to communicate something very important to him. Needed to, needed his support, but somehow they ended up starting a war in the living room. He yelled. She threw things, slammed the bedroom door and wasn't seen for the rest of the night. The neighbors, who share the living room wall, banged so hard on the thin partition she thought they were trying to bring it down.

Cut to her sitting ridged on the covered toilet seat, short clad legs sticking to the perspiring plastic in the June weather because their rental apartment didn't come with air conditioning. She reaches out a hand and jiggles the crystal doorknob. It's the heavy kind seen in wartime style houses. Her house had them when she first moved in. Whoever fixed up this place obviously forgot the majority of the bathroom. Half of it is swallowed by the modern walk-in shower. Clumped in the remaining four feet is a leaky pedestal sink with ancient star faucets, it looks like it's from the 1920s. Then the peach colored toilet with the cracked basin, cheesy painted flowers on the tank and random mood swings where the handle needs to be jiggled for any plumbing function to occur. She thinks it's from the 1950s.

She doesn't know why she locks the door when Sam's obviously not home. Maybe in overcompensation. Maybe she's going insane from listening to the constant tick, tick, tick, that she could use as a metronome. The drip, drip, drip from the pipe under the sink, water plummeting into a metal bowl. The couple upstairs moves around their chairs for the fifth time since Sam left for work a few hours ago. She thinks they ballroom dance.

The whole situation is so hopelessly fruitless. She knows the answer already, there's only going to be one eventual outcome. On the narrow sink ledge a few inches from her face, the egg timer counts down like a bomb. Increased sense of smell, fatigue, nausea, tender breasts, constantly having to pee, literally wanting to rip every single person limb from limb because all she wants is a Tim Horton's coffee.

A missing period.

She's never been late, not when she was shot, not when chemicals whitewashed her lungs, not during all the stress she endured after moving to France, not during all her years at the SRU. She's three weeks late, she's obviously retaining something more than water. Her hands wring together, then straighten the hem on her shorts, then fan out her bangs, then tighten her ponytail, then fall back to the hem again. Finally she catches them between her thighs and tries to act as casual as she can while freaking out in the mausoleum of a bathroom quickly heating up in the afternoon sun.

After the whole day is concentrated in two single minutes, two pink lines materialize like jail bars on the test and her stomach swells with a mixture of feelings. Despondence, she's not going back to the SRU, at least not within the next year as planned. Even then they'd have found a replacement for her; she can't just step back onto Team One expecting them to kick out the two, three, four or five year substitute just because she's simply ready to go back to work. Sam wasn't fond of her going back to begin with; the addition of a baby is just going to underline his protective streak.

Anxiety, how can she be a mother when she can't even talk? How can she connect with this baby inside of her for nine months, when she can't stare down at her burgeoning stomach and whisper shared secrets? Or more likely growl expletives because of the shit this baby will put her through. Communicating with Sam is difficult, and he knew her voice, knew the cadence it held, and knew her base reactions to most things. How will this baby learn anything from her when she has no way to teach it?

Yet somehow she's completely at peace. Like the general idea of this baby infiltrating her body unannounced or unrequested is the most natural thing in the world. Toronto General better be ready for the world's quietest labor.

The rest of the day is spent reclining on the chunky couch with her hand on her flat but solid stomach. She wonders just how long this baby has been incubating. The laptop is in sleep mode and she contemplates writing an email to the Team, but she still hasn't told them about the impromptu wedding. Bringing up both life changing events in the same email is only going to prompt 'shotgun' comments. Really it was just blind luck they happened to get married when they did.

Sam comes home with a bag of groceries because it's Tuesday and they were supposed to go together but the fight marred their usual schedule. She can't even remember what it was about; they usually begin small over miniscule things like him leaving the toilet seat up and bloom into rampant e-text conversations about how neither of them appreciates what the other does.

He kicks the door closed behind him and it slams shut. An angry groan stifles only a fraction when he notices her. He's still apparently upset he had to get the groceries, because he just finished work. She made the list. Wrote down to make a game out of it, see how fast he could do it. If this were any other day she would complain he can speak the goddamn language with his own goddamn voice, but the fight seems so superfluous now.

The paper bag sets on the kitchen counter and his eyes flicker to hers only for a moment before darting away. "Jules, I had a really bad day okay?" He shrugs off his spring jacket and hangs it on the coat rack behind the front door. "The new recruits are going to kill themselves with those bombs. Can we not get into this now?"

The sun still filters through the goddamn window in the kitchen. A cool wind wafts through and rustles the sheer black curtain. She approaches him at a casual speed and he only watches her. This is where their communication falters. He doesn't know whether she's going to embrace or attack him so he stands ramrod straight expecting either response.

Instead, she grabs one of his hands in hers, large palm warm and a little sweaty from nerves or anger. She shifts the test so he's holding the proper end of it and turns her back to him so he can fill in the blanks while she puts away the groceries. She tried to tell him last night she'd been in denial for three weeks. How she actually ventured out of the house earlier in the day to the pharmacy and picked up a generic pregnancy test much to her chagrin and their pharmacist's delight. How he just kept saying things about bébés and M. Braddock. How he gave her the pregnancy test for free and wished her 'bonne chance'.

She unpacks the single bag, the same generic food greets her. Milk, bread, peppers, mushrooms and a slab of red bloody meat her stomach clenches. She pulls out a bundle of kale and shakes her head. He probably meant to get spinach, but grabbed the wrong green instead; he's not going to like kale. It's bitter. The rustling of the bag is louder than Sam, and while untangling stalks of kale she glances to him.

He's working a quick cycle between staring at the test, staring at her, and staring at her stomach. Does he even know two pink lines equal a positive? Isn't it common knowledge? She should have got a test where the answer key is printed right on it. If she really wanted to piss him off she could shove a couch cushion up her top and gesture to it wildly until he got the idea. She was expecting either a positive or negative reaction. Any reaction is better than none at all. No reaction means he doesn't care. If he doesn't care—

"Is this positive?" Idling, he showcases the test. Like she doesn't know what he's referring to.

She can't stop the expression she makes. Judging, confused, jumbled eyebrows. Eyes wide as her agape mouth. Why the hell would she give him a negative pregnancy test? To rub his face in it, the idea they could have had a child? Maybe if he cared more? Was present more? Even after their fight she's not that harsh, not that malicious. She grew up in a household set in those ways; she doesn't want to emulate them. A whole new wave of harmful emotions courses through her at his intentions.

But he's moving, stops a few feet before her, settling the test on the side of the kitchen sink. The seeds of a grin growing on his face. "You're pregnant?"

Outside in the street the sound of children's laughter echoes. She can't look at him. Can't look out the window. Can't look at anything. Looks at her stomach. Hand gravitates towards the firmness and she nods once.

"Oh my God." He laughs; it's a genuine laugh he carries buried in his throat for the rarest of occasions. The last time she heard it was the day they declared her completely healthy at the hospital and discharged her. Sam held her in her living room and laughed. Breathed her in as they basked in the luxury of being in her own house.

Now he embraces her much in the same way. Hot body pressing against hers, caring hands cradling the back of her head, fingers playing with her ponytail as he laughs into her neck like she's granted him some miraculous wish. He keeps repeating, "Oh my God."

He kisses the side of her neck, her jaw, and her cheek. It's not meant to be passionate, but to show his gratitude. He's experiencing the surge of emotions she did in the bathroom. Only eight hours of lounging on the couch lessened their impact.

The rough pad of his thumb strokes her cheek when he kisses her lips, soft and lovingly. He looks into her eyes and she sees his excitement, his panic. "We're really going to have a baby?"

She nods her head in his hand.

"Oh my God." He hugs her back to him. "I'm going to be a dad. You're going to be a mom. You're to have our baby—" And while he's going through listing obvious genetic connections she finds the hand not crushing her and settles it between her top and her waist band. Immediately his rambling stops.

"Oh my God." The words hold more meaning this time, are spoken in a gentler tone as he slides away from her to observe her stomach. The sturdiness, the protectiveness already present in her body and not from the workout routine she adopted a few months back. "It's really in there."

She nods again. Patient with his stupid questions. If he asks her where it's going to come out she might have to punch him. His hand rubs back and forth, thumb brushes above her navel. Maybe he's trying to elicit a response months in advance, or maybe he's just trying to figure out when this, all of this, happened.

"I love you Jules. And I love this baby. And I love you for this baby." She remembers what he said when he proposed to her, about how she could never make his life any better. She didn't know at the time it was a lie.

They both spend the rest of the night reclining on the couch coming to terms with the immediate future ensconced with them. His hand never leaves her stomach and ever half an hour he rouses from the happiness induced stupor to babble some aimless thing they now have to do. Like tell his parents. Tell Natalie. Buy a car seat. Baby proof her house. Make a doctor's appointment. Get 'those' vitamins. Think of names. Some are more important than others.

He tells her he wants to know everything about how she's feeling, because she is a very private person. Despite him being her husband, despite what it took to get a baby to grow inside of her. She leans her head back and gives him a half-lidded expression telling him he'll learn what he needs to learn when she wants to correspond it.

"I'm serious Jules. We're in this together. If you're craving something, or, I don't know you get a leg cramp or something—"

Leg cramp? This is a pregnancy, not the Tour De France.

"I should know. I want to help you. I'll go out and get whatever food you're craving. I'll cook it. I don't care what time it is or how unnatural it may be—"

Yeah, unnatural like she might actually start to enjoy the food here. The only thing she's been craving for the last nine months is a Tim Horton's coffee. Which now she can't even have. Well there's decaf, but it's just not the same.

"It just." He sighs and massages her stomach softly. "We're married, even if we weren't, we're in this together. Don't try to do it alone."

Touché. Apparently talking to himself within the apartment walls for the last nine months has made Sam quite the orator. Her head relaxes on his arm and she nods, excepting his stake in their fetus.

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter: The chapter everyone will hate (I mean aside from the last chapter because I left the ending very open)<br>_


	8. Pop

_A/N: Hey Guys, here is the chapter that I put up before Christmas just to ruining your holidays, because I'm like that. I will restate my French is a little bit rusty. So please excuse it if it seems wrong.  
>A few people have asked about other stories. Just-World is slowly coming together, mostly because my mom has an iron grip on me and won't let go (I live far away from her and only see her once a year). But I do have a just Just-World notebook and it is almost full. There are a few oneshots kicking around, Dominant and Recessive is rough drafted and I'm strongly leaning towards doing a sequel to Aphonous because some of the scenes are already written (which is the third installment of Sam perspective, I was just writing for fun though).<br>Thanks so much to those of you who took the time to review/favorite/alert and read. I'm glad the story can bring a little solace to you during those bad days especially around the holidays as mundane things become monumental. Can't say when the next chapter will be up. I'm going to aim for Boxing Day (the 26th) or the 27th.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 8

Pop

Three months later it's the middle of September and Sam is on his second last day of contract work. They offered him an extension, a pay raise and an actual house closer to the base. When he told her, she had to hold her hand back from punching him. Under no circumstances will their baby be born in France.

She's twenty weeks, or five months along now. Well, as close to five months as can be approximated by the French obstetrician. He didn't want to okay her for flying home in two days; she almost leapt off the examination table, fingers keen on feeling the flesh of his neck. Lucky for him Sam straightened things out, explained their situation. If she has to she'll swim across the Atlantic.

She has a stomach now, well a protruding, bulbous one. At least to her. Sam is enamored with it. She wakes to his hands settled around it like how professionals hold basketballs. Since he read somewhere the baby can actually start to hear at five months he hasn't shut up. It's completely ordinary for him to just uncover her stomach when they're at home and start a monologue. He tells the baby his 'family secrets', uses her belly button like a microphone. When his stories take fantastical turns she snorts and he gives her a hurt look. If he's really upset, he'll start to talk in French, then her loving caresses through his hair become a backhanded slap. Really, she's just jealous because the baby will recognize his voice.

He helps out more in the kitchen. Is learning from her how to cook the food they always bring home that just ends up somehow prepared on his plate. Sometimes her front is heavy and she needs to rest so she sets her stomach against the counter.

"Don't put the baby on the counter."

He forces her to sit down, but the food gets ruined and then all three of them go hungry. Sometimes she has to direct him on what to do. Sometimes they just get takeout.

She hates going outside even more now. People can tell she's pregnant and apparently all personal boundaries don't apply to pregnant women. Random French people just approach and touch her stomach, cooing in random French words she can't understand. It's summer, she's pregnant, uncomfortable and there's barely a complete layer of fabric protecting their baby from crazy hands. But the protective Sam streak finally proves useful. He places a defensive hand around her shoulders, another on her stomach and guides her away. Sometimes giving a brief explanation in French.

He was right about the leg cramps. There are also back cramps that happen like clockwork. All the afflictions with her lungs and the previous bullet through her torso do not make for a sturdy body to house a growing human. Muscles ache constantly and there are days when she can't even get out of bed because she's in so much pain. She can't imagine what labor is going to be like. Sam told her to get an epidural, or suggested they schedule a c-section. She doesn't like either of those options. She can get shot, but not deliver her own baby? Please.

By this point in the pregnancy, Sam's logged enough hours to become a professional masseuse. Something she suggests he pursue once they get back to Toronto. Her paid medical leave due to inhalation of corrosive chemicals is only good for a year, and with his job ending they're going to have no money and another mouth to feed.

He chuckles while pressing the sides of his thumbs into her lower back. She arches into the pressure because it feels so damn good. He always knows where it hurts, told her he can tell just by the way she's walking where she's hurting. "Well right now Bump is content to siphon a bit of your food."

She rolls her eyes. He calls the fucking baby, Bump. He thinks it's endearing. She thinks it's the name of an old, blind hound dog. Once she gained the first miniscule protrusion in her stomach he started referring to their baby as 'Bump'. How's Bump doing today? I have to stop at the store on my way home, does Bump want anything special? Bump is really rocking those jeans. She has the fear their kid will be five, in a department store and Sam will call out "Bump" and their kid will answer, "Here Daddy." What if it's a girl? He's going to psychologically fuck them up.

"Stop worrying." He kisses behind her ear and she's fully aware he has no clue to what exactly she's worrying about. His hands fall to the side of her stomach and he's waiting for a kick. Has been waiting for the last three months for a kick. She started feeling them a month ago, bubbles bursting, popcorn popping, tiny flutters. She pictures the baby as a butterfly trapped in a net and wonders if it feels like anything like she does.

Sam leaves for work and she continues to pack up their apartment, the semblance of a life they've created within thin, now off-white walls in the last year. They have a few large cardboard boxes, mostly for kitchen items but all the clothing she's squeezing into luggage so it can be taken with them right away. The potted plant from their wedding sits on the windowsill in the kitchen and she needs to check online to see if customs will let her take it back to Canada. It would be a shame to have to leave it here, the downfall of embracing things that last too long.

She checks her email and there's still no response from the Team. She sent out an email a little over a month ago explaining her current condition, her current marital status, and when she and Sam would be back in Toronto. She expected plans to be forged, not that she wants a parade in her honor, she just wants to see the guys.

Around noon she has to rest because the left side of her back goes stiff, then numb, then she can't move. She lands on the couch and sighs, wondering why this baby hates her. The humid September wind rustles leaves outside the window and she starts to drift to sleep.

When her eyes close, the phone rings which is unusual. The phone doesn't ring unless it's for Sam. His bosses, his job; they know about her condition. How useless it would be to try to hold a conversation with her, especially by phone. The answering machine reel clicks on and Sam's enthusiastic voice states a generic French greeting, his voice peaking at the mention of M. and Mme. Braddock. He rerecorded it right after they got married.

After the beep an unfamiliar voice fills the room. It starts with a long, "Uhhh." And then a pause. At first she thinks it's a prank call but the voice continues in very broken English to state there's been an accident at the base and just the name of a hospital. The machine beeps saving the message.

She sits up ignoring the pain corkscrewing in her side. Cautiously eyes the machine like the whole message was a dream. She's been having some weird ones lately. Ones inspired by science fiction movies Sam keeps forcing her watch where aliens pop out of people's chests. But the machine's message button winks at her so she replays it. Hears the inherent panic in the smattering of English between the stumbling over of French verbs. Something happened to Sam. Sam's in the hospital.

* * *

><p>The hospital is hectic. It's confusing. It's francophone. She doesn't know what to do because she's never been on this side of the situation before. Usually she's unconscious when she enters hospitals. Her hand absently rests on her stomach as people in the emergency waiting room rush by her. Babies cry, women sob. It's very overwhelming and she starts to feel nauseous because she doesn't know where to go first.<p>

There are signs, in French of course, but they direct her, in arrows, to a nurse behind a desk who glances up at her. She says something in French and she sighs. It's going to be near impossible to get beyond the double communication block. She covers her mouth with her hand and shakes her head, hoping it will be sufficient enough to get the no talking point across. The nurse only stares at her blankly. It's times like these she wants to strangle Sam and his no giving up policy. She thinks of Sam again and ignores the mortification.

"Votre bébé?" The nurse points to her stomach with a pen from the other side of the glass.

She shakes her head again, but digs through her purse for a pen and writes Sam's name down on it. Points to the computer.

The nurse looks at the name and shrugs, a nervous smile coming to her plump lips. "Je suis désolé. Je ne comprend pas."

After precious minutes wasted pointing at Sam's name, the computer and finally the rings on her finger, something clicks in the nurse's head and her dainty fingers click over keys. "M. Braddock?"

She nods, heart speeding up, baby bouncing around on an adrenaline surge of her anxious feelings. The nurse's lips drain in density, pull into a slack smile. One of pity, one she remembers from the her own hospital stays and she knows this isn't going to be good.

She's lead down a lime colored hallway and into a semi-dark room. Sam lays half haloed by a privacy curtain, hooked up to some of the same machines she was. A heart monitor, blood pressure gauge, IV with a plump bag of drugs, oxygen mask. His right arm is padded like he's going to play hockey, but instead it's gauze. He's been burned. More gauze sits on his right cheek curling up towards his eye like the morbid beginnings of clown makeup.

Without waiting for the nurse's permission, or for her to explain what happened in foreign words she'll never understand, she abandons her purse near the doorway in shock. Lets it fall open to the floor and approaches his bedside. His chest is bare with a few bandages strewn across it. His body gradates from white to red from left to right. What happened to him being untouchable? What happened to his turtle falling being the worst thing she had to deal with?

His left hand furls on his thigh in his sleep. An indication of pain. She wonders how bad the burns are. Wonders what the fuck he was doing when this happened. Did he even think of the baby? He's still wearing his wedding ring. He's left-handed, so it adorns his left ring finger. Probably a good thing if he didn't want it melted and merged in with his skin.

Her fingers move between the opening his hand creates. He's hot. Too hot. Still on fire. It's like handling a pot fresh from the stove, touching the tap after scolding water has been flowing out of it for the last five minutes, banging into the stupid radiators in the apartment. The apartment they won't be leaving any time soon.

With effort his eyes crack open, the blue now dull and clouded with smoke. He grins at her, kind of lopsided like he wants her to know everything is okay, when it's obviously not. She can feel her heartbeat in her throat. He squeezes her hand and licks his lips. "Hey Sweetheart."

She gives him a watery grin. Teeth crashing off each other as she runs her free hand shakily through his dry hair. It has the density of straw. Her chest starts heaving in sobs before she can control her emotions. The dams break behind her eyes and tears spill down her cheeks.

"Hey, hey, hey." He tugs on her hand, offers her a little chuckle in hopes of lifting her spirit. "It's not as bad as it looks, I promise."

She nods, runs a cool hand over his burning cheek and places her lips there. Lets them loiter, trembling against his skin. Normalcy captures them when his hand caresses her stomach under her shirt. Through the pain he probably can't feel the baby's kickboxing.

"You should sit down." His voice sounds weak, distant, dissonant. It's terrifying to hear him sound so different. Terrifying to think how different the day could have unfolded. "Your back's probably killing you."

She tremulously inhales against his skin at the suggestion. He smells like a campfire. His concern for her overpowers the pain he must be feeling. The pain being doused by a giant bag of morphine, being wrapped in bandages so it doesn't lead to infection.

* * *

><p>Two and a half weeks later, she returns to the hospital for the last time. Sam's being released tomorrow and they have tickets home the same day. She had to get re-cleared by the obstetrician who was even more wary of her flying closer to her third trimester. She was ready to break his hand if he didn't sign the form.<p>

Sam was half right about his injuries. He sustained light second degree burns from a bomb that went off on the base. The recruits were doing their final examination of disarming explosives when someone actually planted a live bomb in the dead lot. He tried to disarm it, but when it became clear it wasn't an option due to time, he cleared everyone out instead and got caught in the butt end of the blast.

His arm had minimal tissue damage, but he needed some physiotherapy to get the mobility back in it. Burns cause engorgement with increased blood flow, the skin on his arm was as tight as plastic wrap and he had to work around it for a week and a half. The burn on his face is healing nicely with only a small amount of residual scarring much like the chemical burn on her neck. They're just doing some routine tests today to make sure he's on schedule for tomorrow's release.

After the first two days he understood her hatred for hospitals. Complained about the food, complained about the gowns and how oddly they're designed. She brought him some clothes, this time he got to wear the sweats and dress shirt with the cuffed up sleeves. She buttoned it up for him, let her fingers linger against his skin, nuzzled his neck, kissed his cheek. He loves the attention, loves the coddling, loves that she wants to take care of him. She loves that he's still alive even though parts of him are a bit crispy.

They walk around the floor together; no machines or IV stands needed. Just the two of them, like in the park back in Toronto. One hand on her stomach, the other supporting her twisting back as he tries to guess what she did the night before. Her nights are silent. Insanely silent. Painful. Sleepless. Full of hunger, bingeing, nausea and then vomiting. Her morning sickness showed up late. He stops every so often, to tell the baby something in whispers she can't hear over his cupped hand against her stomach and the standard hospital din. Stops to play with or fix her hair. Stops to kiss her, smell her skin, and tell her he loves her. He makes her shiver in September.

Today when she walks into Sam's room he's a completely different person. A reflection, a shadow of the man she married, the man she loves. He's yelling, in French of course, at a man in a lab coat, who keeps responding in a calm even tone which only proves to piss Sam off more. Flashbacks of a lifetime ago, of negotiating with people holding knives, bombs and guns, people on edges comes flooding back.

The doctor nods at her, and leaves them alone in the room. Sam sits on the edge of his bed, nostrils flaring with each deep inhalation he takes. She sits in a chair, pulls it across from him until their knees touch. Pretends a lash of pain doesn't zigzag its way up her back. Pretends she's not going to need new maternity jeans soon. Pretends she's not bothered they don't have the money to buy them.

He won't look at her. Maybe he feels like he's failed her, which couldn't be further from the truth. Without him she would have nothing. Sure she'd be in Canada where she might have a prestigious job on the SRU and understand more than a tenth of the things spoken to her, but she'd have nothing. She reaches out a hand to touch his face, to tip his chin forward. And for the first time since she had five guns turn on his cocky ass in the middle of Toronto, he wrenches away from her.

The action burns and batters her heart, overpowering the ache in her back and slowly she withdraws her hand. Eyes unable to meet his.

"There's something wrong with my eye, Jules."

No, 'Hi Sweetheart', or 'How's Bump today?' He's digging the scalpel right into the flesh of their exposed relationship.

He pokes at the red, puffy lobster skin around his right eye. The tightness where there used to be fatigue and impulsive wrinkles. "I can't see out of it well. It's blurry. The burn messed it up. The doctors think I might not regain my full vision."

She wants to convey it's what they said about her voice, and he hasn't given up on her. She's been speechless for a year and he won't let her look into other options. Vision is a weird thing, it might just be temporary. Wants to hold his hand, but can't take him pulling away from her again.

He chuckles, almost mockingly, scornfully and she wants to know what happened to her husband. What happened to her Sam? She knew hospitals were inherently evil, tried repeatedly to convince him of this, but somehow, being in this place has tainted him. "Jules, how the fuck am I supposed to do my job when I can't see? I was born a sniper and all I need now is the fucking General calling me and telling me how I'm failing this time. I'm so tired of failing Jules." He shoves away the portable beside table and it skids across the ground, hitting the wall with full force. "I'm so fucking tired of failing."

He's not failing her. He's always been there for her. Always took care of her when no one else gave a shit, even her own family. He's sacrificed so much for her and all she wants to do is tell him she's so proud of him. So proud to call him her husband. So proud to share his last name. So proud to create a life with him, because he'll be an amazing father. She fails all the time and he doesn't give a shit, and it's because it's not failing. It's living, what they're doing is living. Living together.

She can't tell him this, just another way she's failing, so instead she moves forward to hold him. To embrace him and kiss him to show him that it doesn't matter if he can't be a sniper and she can't be a cop. They're a family now and that's more important.

But he pushes her away, hand on her shoulder shoving her back as he shifts away on the bed. Voice shooting embers. "Jesus Jules, I told you this isn't something you can just hug away. It's not going to go away. I'm fucked. My life is fucked. I lost something critical to my existence, but you don't get that do you?"

And just like that, something inside of her snaps. Her right eye twitches as she watches him continue to berate her with a rage she knows is misplaced, but cuts as deeply as if it were perfectly aimed. He may have sacrificed a lot for her, but she's given up equal amounts for him. A city she knows, a house where she's comfortable, a language she understands, a Team she loves.

He's still yelling at her as she grabs the straps of her purse, jostled momentarily by her shifted center of gravity. He doesn't stop when she leaves the room. She doesn't come back.

* * *

><p><em>Next Chapter - Some familiar faces. Four of them. I love the speculations as much as you love the updates. I'll even give you a hint: not all of them are from Team One. <em>


	9. Naevus

_A/N: Hey Guys. I hope you had a Happy Holidays. This chapter is probably the shortest of them all, but it's my favorite, mainly because I get to bring back the dialogue.  
>Answering a few more questions: Aphonous is the medical term for speechlessness or being voiceless or in a more negative probably old time-y sense being unable to speak and dumb. Also SYuuri was absolutely right. The four familiar faces are just Ed x four. You can never have enough Ed.<br>Finally thank you to everyone who took the time to review/favorite/alert and of course read. I'm glad I could give you a break from Holiday Specials.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 9

Naevus

Natalie welcomes her with opened arms at the airport. Crouches level with her stomach in the hustle of the arrivals; gives the baby reserved waves like it can already observe its dear Aunt Natalie and coos to it in a language she understands. After a nine hour flight constituting sitting next to a fat, sweaty man who would not stop open mouth coughing, it was nice to see a familiar face. Nat didn't do too much damage to the house either. She actually took great care of the place, there are a few scuff marks on the living room wall and a few stains on the undersides of couch cushions, but after a year and change worse could have been expected.

They're putting away clothing in the closet when she gets emotional. Keeps pulling out smaller, form fitting shirts from a lifetime before. Before when she didn't have to use the maternity department. Before when she could see her feet. Before when her breasts, back, feet and legs didn't constantly ache. Before she had a responsibility to a fetus. Before she had a husband. Before she had a fiancé. Before she had a boyfriend in a sordid love affair. Before she left him.

"He called me you know. Wanted to know if I heard from you."

She shrugs, not really caring what the fuck Sam wanted. Wants. She let him in, over the years and against her initial judgment of him, she let him in. Told him things about herself, about her family no one knows. Showed him her weaknesses and hesitantly let him care for her in the shadow of nothing and no one. He repaid her by acting like her father, like her brothers. By turning and biting her caring hand. She got an earlier flight, headed from the hospital to the apartment. Took her luggage, left her rings. Said au revior to France that same day.

"I told him you texted me from the plane. He exploded. Like, I've never heard him swear so much Jules. And I was around for his angsty teenage years where it was him versus my dad."

The baby kicks her right in the kidney. It's a low shot since the kid is drifting higher in her body, floating nearer to the bottom of her lungs. She tires very easy, within the matter of three heavy breathes. All the voodoo and previous medical history surrounding her lungs and her chest puts a strain on her body, pulls her forward, pulls her down, cramps her up. At least it's drifted away from her back, but it's only growing, can only get bigger. Only more vengeful for not having his voice present, asking them questions and telling them stories. Not having his warm hand to move over the expanse of her stomach placating its growing form inside.

"Oh my God, are you okay?" Natalie stops mid-fold to watch her jam a thumb into the area just under where her ribcage fades on her left side. There's the stab, stab, stab of the ache and then another swift kick.

She nods, face contorted in pain and gestures for her to come closer. Sam's sister takes a cautious step. She holds out her hand and Nat responds in a few seconds by offering her own in return. She places Nat's boney, warm hand on the side of her stomach and watches the girl jump.

"Holy shit, that thing is really kicking." Nat keeps her hand in place when she releases it. Watches the flower-patterned shirt over her stomach like cats watch fish tanks, eyes glowing trying to trace invisible movements under the fabric. "Sam would really love this."

Too bad he's too busy failing to care.

The next day Natalie leaves to visit out West for two months. Promises to come back a few weeks before the baby is born. It's her first experience as an aunt and she doesn't want to miss it. Natalie also wants to throw the baby shower. An idea she hasn't completely embraced.

She spends the rest of the week getting reacquainted with her house, with the creaks and cracks she's missed. With her bed, the perfect mattress that manages to hurt her back so much she needs to retrieve couch cushions to fit between her thighs which is how she finds out about the stains. Sam's toiletries are scattered around her bathroom like he still belongs there. Maybe he does, she wants him too, loves him and—she pushes emotional thoughts down. Ignores them. She opens the cupboard under the sink in the bathroom to shove his shit into the dark depths and the door ricochets off her stomach. She rubs the indent. Besides he forgot something at her place and knows it.

* * *

><p>Three weeks later she's twenty-six weeks pregnant. She's huge, can't bend over anymore, and to her horror is constantly hitting doors off her stomach because she's not used to the protrusion. Cupboard, car, entrance, exit, they all bounce off the medicine ball hidden inside her top. She mouths 'I'm sorry' and rubs the bump; the poor kid is going to be born with a permanent dent in its head.<p>

She drives her jeep for the first time, maybe the last before winter comes. It's almost November and again she's missed the blossoming of her perennials. One year she'll catch them. She ends up driving down familiar congested roads delayed with construction and something about it mollifies her, heats her down to the boots her feet hardly fit into. They're swelling badly. Everything on her is. Even if she still had her wedding and engagement rings, she doesn't think her sausage fingers would be able to fit inside them. She can't even look at herself in the mirror anymore.

She ends up in the parking lot of a recognizable building, a place like her second home and she doesn't know what compels her to do it, but she parks the jeep and heads inside. Maybe it's the fact no one has answered her stupid emails in months. She gets they all have families and personal lives, but really, no one could take the time to send her a few quick lines? Another part of her misses Sam and needs to see a few friendly faces to fill the void. She's pregnant; she needs constant reassurance, constant comfort, and a little love now and then wouldn't hurt.

The elevator opens and it's like walking back into high school. Everything is exactly as she left it, including Winnie who sits exuding ennui at the dispatch desk. Her hair is a little shorter; she looks a little darker from a Canadian summer spent by the lake. "I need you to sign in—Oh my God Jules."

She grins, the first time since seeing Natalie. It's nice to be missed. Nice to be rewelcomed.

The dispatcher's eyes land on her stomach, her mouth falling agape. "Wow, you're really—Wow."

Pen is already scratching against paper, scribbling out important questions.

"You still can't—?" Winnie asks looking her straight in the eyes, grasping the piece of paper. She nods. She likes Winnie, not many people would have the guts to ask it. Not many people would feel comfortable enough around her to ask it.

Reading the question Winnie answers with a distressed expression. "No, we didn't get any of your emails after the engagement one." Her own face adopts the same expression and Winnie continues, "Jules, Sarge started—"

"Winnie is there anything on the radio yet?" Ed exits the workout room; towel draped around his neck, a 'v' of perspiration soaking his shirt and slightly out of breath. He appears older, has aged more than a year in the same amount of time.

"Nothing yet Ed." Winnie answers, clacks on the keyboard doing busy work and points to her.

"What?" And then he notices her and laughs. It's not cruel, not like how she remembers Sam's laugh in the hospital room, but heartwarming. "Mademoiselle Julianna Callaghan." Oh boy, have they not got her emails. Sarge really needs to check his inbox more often.

Ed leans in for a hug, but then he really notices her. "Holy shit Jules. Did you smuggle a little immigrant back from France with you? When did this happen."

Six fingers go up as proxies for months and she tries not to notice the minor falter in his face when he learns she's still voiceless.

"Ed listen, if I work out anymore I think I'm going to have a heart attack. How come Raf got to go—" Spike pauses midsentence before staring at her. "Jules, you're back."

The way Ed is standing blocks out the majority of her stomach, so when Spike hugs her, he received the brunt of a pregnancy bump. "Jesus, what do you have in your purse?" But as he glances down the joviality drains from his face. Instead a shocked expression of clarity remains. "A souvenir from France?"

"Used it already, Spike."

"Maybe if you didn't make me work out like I'm training for a cage fight." Spike mumbles and turns his attention back on her. Hands hovering over her stomach like it's a bomb. "When did this happen."

"She's six months along." Ed interjects for her. She smiles in gratitude. This is what she has been missing the last year. These guys may not be her real family, but they know her. They understand her. Maybe not as well as Sam, but they still treat her the same way. She doesn't feel out of place when she obviously should.

Spike's fingers clench and unclench, wiggle through the air like he's typing on an invisible keyboard as he tries not to stare at her stomach. Apparently he's not good with pregnant women.

"So, Sam must be ecstatic." Ed's leaning with his back against the dispatch desk. This time the interjection is to save Spike.

She holds up her hand and Ed mutters, "What an idiot."

"I don't get it."

"There's no ring, Spike."

It's not really fair because they don't know the whole story. They're making rash judgments on Sam, when the majority of the time in France he was her rock. The thing that kept her from cracking. Sure he was the reason she was there, but he was the thing that made it better.

"Do you want us to go talk some sense into him Jules?"

"Yeah, my uncle forced my cousin to get married because of the same reason. I mean I've only seen it done once but I think I could manage—" She grabs Spike's hand midair and places it on her stomach as the baby is in the middle of its acrobatic routine. "Oh man," he yelps but doesn't pull his hand away from the somersaulting life within her. "This kid can kick."

"Jules, are you sure about—"

She mouths three words and all conversation about Sam stops. I left him.

Ed nods once, stiffly in comprehension.

Spike bends his head closer to her stomach, apparently over his fear of girly parts. "Does it make sounds?"

Ed groans. She's missed it. The banter, the guys. Her guys, all of them even though a lot of them are missing. The main one is missing. Doesn't care about her or—She reaches forward and embraces Spike again. Clinging to him with the full effect of pregnancy hormones. He mumbles an 'okay' and awkwardly pats her on the back.

"You know why you're here we should get a picture for Greg. He'd hate that he missed you, especially in this condition." Ed chuckles at the last part, shaking his head and disappearing apparently to retrieve a camera or cell phone.

She mouths 'Sarge' to Spike because she hasn't seen him. Wants to know where he is, what happened, why he hasn't been answering her emails. She misses him.

"He started drinking almost a year ago. He's in a rehab program right now." The news hits her like Sam's words did. How did this happen? How could she not know? But then she remembers his last email, the one with the garbled spelling and a little part of the past bleeds within her.

Ed snaps the photo with her fake smile after just hearing the news. Spike has his one arm behind her and his other on the top of her stomach. Apparently it's addicting. The guys promise to fit her into their schedules and she feels like a burden, a liability. Ed must sense something about her financial woe because he says they need someone to train and run the drills starting in September and he'll put in a good word for her. Spike tells her she needs to see his new place, his bachelor pad, 'The Spike Cave' he calls it with an eyebrow wiggle. Ed tells her she needs to come see how much Izzy has grow, and as much as his daughter loves Wordy's girls, she'll love having a playmate closer to her own age. They make plans for coffee. They make plans to go visit Sarge. Part of it is so rudimentary, so normal it's almost passable. But the larger part of it is empty. Like her whole life is fake.

* * *

><p><em>Last Chapter - Nothing gets resolved. Seriously, think of everything you want to happen in the final chapter. It won't happen. I gave you fair warning. <em>


	10. Nesting

_A/N: The time has come in our relationship where we call what this really was and both go our separate ways. I hope you've enjoyed the love affair with Aphonous as much as I have. A sequel is in the works if there is enough popular demand for it, and by popular demand I mean if one person is like, "Do a sequel Shiggity" (which SYuuri has basically already held me too because she wants a happy ending) I'll do it. But it's not going to be completely happy. Life isn't completely happy or perfect. My proof of this is that I'm not Ke$ha.  
>A final thanks to everyone who took the time to reviewfavorite/alert and of course read. Thanks for all of your e-love and support. I'm glad I could entertain you for such a short span of time. Please enjoy this unsatisfying conclusion I offer to you and have a Happy New Year.  
><em>

Aphonous

Chapter 10

Nesting

A week later it's November. The depressed sky looms over the city. It's the color of old metal, heavy with water retention because the first winter snow hasn't fallen yet. She spent the day figuring out the nursery. It's hard decorating for a baby whose gender she doesn't know. Didn't want to find out. A baby she hasn't met. Didn't plan for. Her baby, who apparently only has a single parent. One who can't talk.

Despite remaining voiceless she outfitted her nursery with a bassinet, a white wooden crib, and patchwork bedding in earth tones with accents of green, damask patterns and random tree frogs. It was the most neutral bedding she could find, and the frogs made her smile. She bought a stuffed one for the crib. Babies always have bears, why not a frog? The rest of the nursery is a combination of furniture she's accumulated over the years because she can't afford to buy more new stuff. An old distressed dresser she was using as a buffet in the living room, a rocking chair she found at a garage sale and stitched cushions for, a bookcase she put in the basement when she moved in because the staircase has one built in. In the future, all the mismatched furniture will need to be painted or stained a unifying color.

The nursery items won't arrive for two weeks. Ed volunteered not only his van, but Raf and Spike's help getting the baby's stuff into her house. They even offered to help her put the nursery together, told her it could be a Team One project. Told her to decide by the time they all go to visit Sarge next week. She will politely decline. The nursery is something sentimental, something she should only be setting up with one other person, and if not him, then by herself. She's already cleared the room of everything, including dismantling the guest bed and reassembling it in her study for Natalie's eventual return.

She stopped at a hardware store and matched paint colors to the bedding. Decided to go one shade lighter in green and leave the baseboards white. She brings home one bucket of paint and one bucket of primer and knows there's an abundance of leftover painting supplies in her basement. She's intent on getting the first coat done today and just prays her overalls still fit. She can't afford new clothes; even if she could her body is growing too rapidly now she'd have to buy new pants every week or two. Outfitting the nursery drained her chequing account. Next month her mortgage is coming from her savings.

Two days ago she had her first prenatal exam since being back in Toronto. The doctor, who her physician recommended her to, was as nice as could be expected. He spoke English and didn't get hung up on the fact that she didn't, or the fact she had been previously shot and chemically doused. After the ultrasound he told her everything looked fine, the baby was active and healthy, but suggested she immediately sign up for a birthing class if she insisted on a natural birth. She wrote on his clipboard, asking who she was supposed to go with, and he replied, "The baby of course."

The paint cans clank against the peeling wood on her porch and she rifles through her pockets for her keys. Puffs of warm breath freeze in the air as the temperature is starting to decline. It might snow tonight, and she inadvertently grins as she thinks of Toronto covered in a blanket of white. Thinks of happier winter memories. Walking in the park in the muted snowfall. Sharing a trashy Christmas tree with someone for the first time in almost twenty years. This year there won't be a second ornament. She doesn't even have the first; she left the angel with her rings and wedding bouquet on the kitchen table in France. She'll be alone again this year for Christmas. Well, almost alone.

She hugs her winter coat tighter to her body as a cruel gust of wind stirs up the sunburned carcasses of dehydrated leaves. The door finally opens and she sighs as the house proves a little warmer than outside. She wants to wait as long as possible to turn on the heat, less money on the monthly bills of an old house that hemorrhages electricity and gas. But another strong gust shoves at her back and tonight may be the night.

Her intention is to set the paint cans onto the hardwood floors with the upmost care. Full paint cans are heavy; they're precarious and are lined with metal ridges invented to scratch the shit out of her hardwood floors. Instead they tumble from her clenched fingers; bottom loaded and dent her beautiful floors. Because he is standing in her living room.

He's wearing a black long-sleeved shirt with half a dozen buttons at the top of it, a few left undone. His right arm, his right hand are fully rotational, swing from being coyly shoved in the pocket of his jeans, to wanting to cross over his chest, but cancel halfway through the action. The burn on his face is invisible, at least from the distance she holds. His eyebrows furrow with an intensity someone who doesn't know him would confuse with frustration. But she can tell by the way his brows teeter that he's feeling regretful.

Outside the wind howls, the air pressure bounces the external door catching her attention. He misinterprets her shift in interest as intent to flee. Stepping forward, his hand reaches towards her in the wide expanse of the room like he could touch her from where he's standing. "Please Jules, please don't leave. I just want to talk."

She nods. His presence and the quivery cadence in his voice unnerves her, but she shuts the door. He's going to apologize because he's Sam. And she's probably going to accept because he's Sam. They love each other and have been through too much shit not to get back together. But he hurt her; she supposes when she broke up with him back when they first dated she hurt him. Told him she loved him and then cast him off into a sea of nothingness. But he pushed her away, didn't even identify with her, didn't even care she left and automatically took their baby. Didn't even attempt to contact her.

"I'm sorry Jules. I'm so sorry. " Sam slouches back on the couch shaking his head and staring at his hands draping over his knees. He's only ever talked with this level of remorse when she's woken up in hospital beds. "You were just trying to help me. I was just in so much pain and that place fucked me up. I was worried about failing the goddamn General and I failed you. I failed you and you were all I had."

After a few minutes she toes off her boots. She can't wear socks with them. She can't afford new boots, so instead she mashes her swollen feet into the shallow casings.

"I was so angry when you left the hospital and I knew we had to head home the next day. And honestly—" He shakes his head, his hand rubbing up and down the back of his neck. Words inebriated and ambling out of his drunk tank mouth. He won't look at her. "I didn't want to see you the next day. Then when you didn't show up, I stopped being angry and started being terrified. I talked to Natalie and she told me you were on a plane."

She shrugs off her coat, tries to remember the state of mind she left France in. How terrifying it was to get on a plane by herself, pregnant, while she couldn't talk. How the abstract definition of the action was so much more horrifying than the physicality of it. How she moved back to the bathroom and cried for a few minutes. How she said it was just hormones.

"I was furious, but when I got back to the apartment and saw your rings—I, I knew it was my fault. You hated it there but stayed for me and I finally pushed you away."

Feet touch the floor and the cold hardwood creaks as she waddles over to the area carpet. The dying daylight reflects off the coffee table shrouding his face in a shadow. Part of her wants to comfort him, but the last time things didn't go so well. Instead she sits on the loveseat opposite to the couch, waiting for him to really tell her what he wants.

"I stayed longer so I could see a few specialists. A few optometrists who said there's a good chance I'll regain full vision in my eye within a few months. That the damage was just superficial. And a psychiatrist so I could figure out why I acted like that towards you so I could never do it again."

The baby must recognize his voice, even if it is muffled and directed at his lap instead of hers. It starts to shift inside of her, like it can't find a comfortable spot to rest. It has to be getting low on space in there.

"Jules, I know that—" He finally looks at her, watery eyes immediately draining and mouth hanging open for a few seconds. "You're huge."

This is not the way to win her back. Self consciously she crosses her arms over where her stomach starts to curve out. The action hides nothing. There's too much of her to hide. She's wearing a long-sleeved gray striped sweater which is pretty low cut for her, but it was on sale and it fit. However, the stripes only accentuate the baby she's packing underneath two extra cup sizes worth of breasts.

"You know I didn't mean it that way." He reaches forward gripping her hand and leads it away from blocking her stomach. His fingers are strong, but so gentle while they hold hers; his temperature is regulated, radiating around hers winter pricked from outside. "You're pregnant and you've never looked more gorgeous."

She knows he wants to touch her stomach. Wants to reach out and reconnect, but after what happened at the hospital they're both too skittish around each other. They can't afford to be skittish, can't afford to play minesweeper. They used to know each other better than any two people in the world, she thinks they still do, and they can't let one stupid mistake mess up their whole relationship. They're having a baby in less than three months.

He looks like he's on the verge of asking. He can't ask her. What happened to the days when she would just be sitting on the couch reading when suddenly his hand would infiltrate her shirt to rest on her stomach? She wasn't even showing then and he cradled her stomach.

Before he opens his mouth, she forces the hand holding hers to the bump. It's more than a bump now; it's an entity of its own. She feels like she's wearing a floatation device made out of stones. She lifts up her shirt to rest on top of her stomach, letting him see the vast expanse of pale skin accented by a dark line bisecting her now outie belly button down to the top of her maternity jeans. She never did get a new pair. They just ride her hips.

He doesn't say anything, doesn't look up at her, doesn't move his hand for a long moment until the baby kicks at him. His body startles back, but then he scurries to the empty seat beside her, hand immediately replacing the same area. "Was that—?"

She nods shifting closer to him. His one hand covers her thigh while the other remains stationary on her stomach. It's warm and it must rouse the baby, because it kicks at him again. He laughs softly, rubs the point of impact. "That was so powerful."

He leans in, face an inch above her skin and chastises, "Bump, stop kicking your mother. Although, I guess I can't call you Bump anymore because you've almost outgrown your mother."

She sighs in exhaustion, in contentment and touches the back of his head, hair feather soft and tickling her fingertips while he begins to explain to the baby his absence over the last month. He adds in ridiculous details about supernatural things and she fears slightly for the future. For their child, who's afraid of everything because of Sam's ridiculous imagination and never wants to leave the safety of their parents' queen-size bed.

The daylight drains from the room as he finishes his adventures and stands to turn on the light. The baby actually stopped kicking halfway through; the Braddock gift of gab put it to sleep. When she tries to lean forward, an ache flourishes from her lower back to the area where a phantom bullet is still lodged just below her left lung. A staggered exhalation escapes her lips.

"Are you okay?" Sam reclaims his seat, hands skimming down her arms to stop beside where her fingers press into her back.

She nods through a pain painted face and a swift stream of air blowing from her mouth.

"Your back?"

Another nod.

Thumbs dig in without another word, kneading and relieving coiled muscles at the base of her back. One hand travels upward, stretching her skin. Despite being back in Toronto, despite having decaf Tim Horton's coffee like it was a delicacy, for the first time since this whole mess began, she starts to relax. She leans back into his hands to create more pressure.

His chin rests on her shoulder, and he places a kiss where her jaw connects with her neck. "I missed you so much Jules."

She nods, turns her head and kisses his cheek. Feels his facial muscles contract into a grin because he knows she feels the same way.

"I brought your rings back for you." His voice is quieter, cautious and it should be. She had hesitations about cementing the relationship to begin with, and after taking concrete steps forward everything went to hell. But as his hands work their way down her back again, she feels the slickness of his wedding band against her skin.

Hers reflect on the table next to the terracotta potted plant. Her bouquet.

She doesn't honestly know if she wants to continue the marriage. Doesn't necessarily want to get divorced, but doesn't want to change all of her documents right away, or wear the rings to let everyone know. They wouldn't fit now anyway. With a marriage there's too much pressure and honestly part of her, no matter how small and infinitesimal that part is, still has reservations as to the real reason Sam came back. He did after all leave something at her place. The last thing she wants is continue on in a relationship with a changed Sam. She wants the man who was there waiting for her when she woke up in the hospital, the one she grew to love over four years at the SRU and one year in France. She doesn't know if this is him anymore.

"You don't have to wear them right now, we can talk about—"

Both his thumbs press on the constriction of muscles surrounding her spinal column near the center of her back. It's an area that always aches, no matter how much she stretches, no matter how long she lets scalding water from the shower burn against it, no matter how she lies with how many pillows in which position. But his thumbs trigger something and the knot in her back finally untwists. It feels so damn good her toes curls, feels so damn good she grins and arches out her back.

"Ah."

Feels so good she lets out a small groan.

Fingers stop their prodding and simultaneously she stiffens, turning to examine him with a questioning expression asking if he heard it too.

"Did you just groan?" Yep, he did.

She nods slowly. It sounded more like a draft of wind blowing sideways through a trumpet. It sounded horrible.

Sam's laughing now. Really laughing. Pregnancy test laughing. He holds both her cheeks and kisses her quickly pausing to add words in between. "I. Told. You. Not. To. Give. Up."

Another nod against his shoulder as he crushes her and the baby to his chest. She's unable to really grasp the importance of a guttural sound hogs create when they roll in their own crap.

"Jules, how can you not be excited about this?"

Because a groan is not a word. A groan takes no talent to manufacture, and realizing this only causes more depression because she still can't do it. She's trying in the back of her throat to orchestrate a variety of animal noises, but nothing seems to take.

"I promise you're going to speak again." His hand touches her stomach and she hopes the baby stays asleep. She doesn't need the added onslaught to her back right now. "You'll teach them how to talk."

The gesture in the right place, but the stress only sets her up for failure. In a year from now when they have a babbling infant crawling through an overly childproofed house, she's going to remember he promised she'd be talking by then. When she's not, she's going to become even more self conscious, more withdrawn. And hold the quietest of grudges.

* * *

><p><em>Sneak Peek at the Sequel - More of the team, more of the families (on both Braddock and Callaghan sides), Sarge makes his first actual appearance since the first chapter, all the fun stuff that comes with the 3rd trimester of a baby and of course it's all held together with angst, angst, angst and the base of a light roux made from vegetable oil and flour and then more angst. <em>


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